THE JUNIOR CHURCH 

* * IN ACTION * * 

WELDON F. CROSSLAND 




CppyrigTit N°^_ 



COPYRIGHT DEPOSIT. 



THE JUNIOR CHURCH 
IN ACTION 

WELDON F. CROSSLAND, B.A. (OXON.) 







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THi: JUNIOR CHURCH CHARTKK 

With signatures of the Charter Members of the Central Methodist Episcopal Junior 
Church. Detroit, Michigan. 



THE JUNIOR CHURCH 
IN ACTION 

WITH 

TWENTY JUNIOR CHURCH SERMONETS 



BY 

WELDON F. CROSSLAND, B.A. (OXON.) 

ASSISTANT PASTOR, CENTRAL METHODIST EPISCOPAL CHURCH, 

DETROIT, MICHIGAN, 1916-1919; PASTOR, NINDE 

METHODIST EPISCOPAL CHURCH, 

DETROIT, MICHIGAN 



WITH AN INTRODUCTION BY 

BISHOP THEODORE S. HENDERSON 




NEW ^2r YORK 
GEORGE H. DORAN COMPANY 



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COPYRIGHT, 1 92 1, 
BY GEORGE H. DORAN COMPANY 



23 I92I 
©CU627854 






PRINTED IN THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA 



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to the leaders of the 

greater church 

of to-morrow: 

THE CHRISTIAN BOYS AND GIRLS 
OF TO-DAY 



INTRODUCTION 

BY 

Bishop Theodore S. Henderson 

It is oft repeated that the children of the church are 
the church of to-morrow. There is no way to save the 
manhood of the world except to save the boyhood of the 
world. It is folly supreme to plan on saving the woman- 
hood of the world if we neglect the girlhood of the world. 
When we save an adult, we are likely to save a unit; 
when we save a child, we save a multiplication table. 
There will be no church to-morrow if there is no religion 
of childhood to-day. 

What is told in this volume is a definite contribution 
toward building the church of to-morrow by building the 
childhood of to-day into the church. There is a vast dif- 
ference between baiting a crowd and building a church. 
There is a long spiritual difference between assembling 
a congregation and building a church. There is a 
tremendous Kingdom difference between erecting a build- 
ing and building a church. A church is more than brick 
and mortar, more than stone and shingles, more than 
nails and paint, more than window glass and furniture. 
One may build all this material into a church building 
without building a church. A church is a group of folks 
who live and labor as a family circle of which God is a 
real father; in which each behaves like a child of God, 
and treats all the other members of the circle as members 

vii 



viii INTRODUCTION 

of God's family. From such a circle it is a Kingdom 
crime to exclude the boys and girls. In the privileges 
and duties of such a circle, boys and girls ought to be 
trained with rare skill and real spirituality. 

Such is the ideal of this book. Its suggestions have 
been tested in the laboratory of boy and girl life. It does 
not dream unreal dreams; it records actual experience. 
The author is a spiritual scientist. He has put these 
chapters into the test tube of the Junior Church with the 
results herein stated. He is at this writing erecting a new 
church building ; he is doing more : he is building a church 
by building the boys and girls into the family life of God. 
There is no substitute for the church in the life of the 
boy or girl. Neither boys' or girls' clubs, nor Sunday 
Schools, nor any other ecclesiastical or social creature 
should separate boys and girls from the family life of 
God expressed in the church. The practice of the prin- 
ciples of this book will help in a vital fashion to build 
the church of to-morrow. 

Theodore S. Henderson. 
Detroit, Michigan. 



PREFACE 

This book is based on three years' experience with the 
Junior Church of the Central Methodist Episcopal Church 
of Detroit. As in Central, so in scores of churches in 
America the Junior Church has served the religious needs 
of the boys and girls of the church with unusual success. 

Although many excellent publications have already ap- 
peared, devoted to Bible stories and other inspirational 
themes, none of them have dealt at all extensively with 
the Junior Church as an organization for Christian wor- 
ship and service among boys and girls. So many pastors 
of various denominations have asked about the purpose 
and methods of the Junior Church that the present volume 
was prepared to tell of the excellent work the Junior 
Churches are doing. 

Much of the material of this publication was secured 
through the liberal response to the two hundred question- 
naires that were sent to as many of the leading pastors 
of the country. Every plan and method cited has been 
tried by some Junior Church and has been found to be 
successful. 

To Bishop H. Lester Smith, formerly pastor of Central 
Methodist Episcopal Church, Detroit, now of the 
Bangalore Area, India, is due much credit for constructive 
criticism in the reading of the manuscript. 

W. F. C. 

Ninde Methodist Episcopal Church, 
Detroit, Michigan. 



CONTENTS 



Part One 

PAGE 

CHAPTER I: THE JUNIOR CHURCH 15 

What Is the Junior Church? — What Does It Do? — 
Increases Church Attendance Among Boys and Girls. — 
Develops the Devotional Side of Their Religious Na- 
tures.— Trains Them in Christian Service Along 
Church Lines. 

CHAPTER II: HOW TO START A JUNIOR CHURCH 22 

Laying the Plans. — Announcing the First Service. — 
Launching the Plans. — Who Will Have Charge of the 
Junior Church? — Can Every Church Have a Junior 
Church? — The Time of the Service. 

CHAPTER III: THE JUNIOR CHURCH SERVICE . . 29 
The Order of Service. — The Boys and Girls Partici- 
pating in the Service. — The Music — Special Features. — 
Memory Work. — The Devotional Attitude. — The Order 
During the Service. 

CHAPTER IV: THE SERMONETS 35 

Is It Easy to Talk to Boys and Girls? — The Range of 
Sermonet Subjects. — How to Illustrate the Sermonets. 
— The Language of the Sermonets. — The Length and 
the Presentation. 

CHAPTER V: ONE HUNDRED AND ELEVEN 

SERMONET SUBJECTS 40 

General Inspirational. — The Old Testament. — The 
New Testament. — Church History. — Church Doctrine. 

CHAPTER VI: THE JUNIOR CHURCH ORGANIZA- 
TION 46 

Should Be Along Denominational Lines. — The Board 
of Trustees and the Board of Stewards. — The Standing 
Committees. — The Societies. — The Ushers. — The Fi- 
nances. — Other Features. 

CHAPTER VII: THE JUNIOR CHURCH ACTIVITIES . 53 
The Expression of the Boy's and Girl's Religious Life. — 
The Life Service Opportunity. — Attendance and Mem- 



XI 1 



CONTENTS 



bership Contests. — Ways of Serving the Church and 
the Community. — Work for Home and Foreign Mis- 
sions. — The Junior Jolly and Other Social Affairs. 



Part Two 

.TWENTY SERMONETS DELIVERED BEFORE THE 

CENTRAL METHODIST EPISCOPAL JUNIOR 

CHURCH, 1918-1919. 

PAGE 

I Good Roads m . 63 

II If I Had a Million Dollars . . ., .. .... 67 

III Keep to the Right 71 

IV A Good Start 74 

V Do You Own Your Face? 78 

VI The Laughter of Jesus 81 

VII How Great God Is 84 

VIII Soldiers of the King 87 

IX Measuring Folks .,.,.... 00 

X What Shall I Be? . . . „ . . . „ . . . 93 

XI Are You in Tune? : „ . . ., . 96 

XII Be Strong 99 

XIII A Book of Rules 102 

XIV Listening to Voices 105 

XV Building Air-Castles 108 

XVI Be a Good Scout in 

XVII Talking with God , ... 114 

XVIII How to Catch Fish 118 

XIX The Message of the Magnet ........ 121 

XX Just Mud,— and a Bulb . . „ ,.. ....... 124 



THE JUNIOR CHURCH 
IN ACTION 



PART ONE 



THE JUNIOR CHURCH 
IN ACTION 

CHAPTER I 
THE JUNIOR CHURCH 

The Junior Church is no longer a new thing in church 
work. Many ministers of many denominations now have 
it as an integral part of their church organization. With- 
out exception they commend it enthusiastically. Scores 
of these junior congregations have sprung up in all parts 
of the country to meet a very real need, until to-day the 
movement has become one of increasing interest to 
church leaders. 

Ranging in size from twenty-five to three hundred 
members, Junior Churches are to be found in churches 
of all sizes, — from one hundred and nineteen to twenty- 
eight hundred members. Wherever the Junior Church 
idea has been fairly tried, it has met with excellent suc- 
cess, has increased the number of boys and girls attending 
the morning church service, and has afforded an unu- 
sually high type of training for them in the work of the 
church. 

What is the Junior Church? It is a regular church 
service and organization for boys and girls, — one that 
seeks to train them in Christian worship and service. It 
serves their religious life in the same way that the regular 

15 



16 THE JUNIOR CHURCH IN ACTION 

church service does the religious life of the adults. Its 
chief features are 

(a.) a regular order of service and organization that 
is as much like that of the denomination as is 
possible ; 

(b.) a sermonet, sometimes two, on some great sub- 
ject of the Gospel, the religious life or church 
history ; 

(c.) a Junior Church choir, with a pianist, who is a 
junior, to lead in the junior congregational 
singing; 

(d.) ushers, officials, offering, — in fact as complete 
an organization along denominational lines as 
the leader may think desirable. 

The service is held at the hour of the regular morning 
worship. In many churches the boys and girls come to 
the regular church service for the inspiration and worship 
of the first part of the service, passing out during the hymn 
just before the sermon. In other churches the two ser- 
vices are separate and contemporaneous. Under the lead- 
ership of the assistant pastor, the deaconess or some com- 
petent person of the congregation, the Junior Church 
carries on its service and activities as does the regular 
church. When boys and girls reach a given age, — four- 
teen, fifteen or sixteen, they are expected to remain in 
the regular church service. 

That boys and girls do not attend the morning church 
service in gratifying numbers is a fact that everyone 
admits and regrets. A look over any congregation will 
reveal this condition. Why are they not there? Here 
are just a few of the answers that many frank pastors 



THE JUNIOR CHURCH 17 

give to this large question. Some of them are abrupt and 
extreme, but all of them have at least some grains of truth 
in them. 

One New York pastor says, "There is little in the aver- 
age service for them." "Parents do not wish to have 
their own worship and that of their friends disturbed by 
their children." "The relaxation of parental control, — 
parents do not insist on their children attending church 
as they formerly did." "The feeling among parents that 
the Sunday School is a sufficient substitute for church 
attendance, — one that meets most of the religious needs 
of the child." "The boys and girls are usually not con- 
sidered when the church service and the sermon are being 
prepared." "Most of the average sermon is 'over their 
heads/ — for the most part meaningless to them." "If the 
church service were as uninteresting to adults as it is to 
children, there would be even fewer of them there." 

Certainly the least we dare say is that the church service 
does not reach boys and girls in anything like the desired 
proportion. 

That the Junior Church brings more boys and girls to 
the church service is strikingly demonstrated in the tab- 
ulated results of the replies to the two hundred question- 
naires. The following chart speaks for itself. 

These churches ranged in attendance among boys and 
girls from one out of two, in a church that had a Junior 
Church, to one out of thirty-seven in a church that had 
neither a Junior Church nor a sermonet. 

The reasons for this increase are fairly evident. The 
boys and girls will attend church if they feel there is 
something there for them. They love the church and 
what it stands for in their lives, but their opinion of the 
church service is often not especially flattering. And 



1 8 THE JUNIOR CHURCH IN ACTION 



church leaders must reckon with that opinion, one-sided 
as it sometimes is. Unless the prevalent idea among boys 
and girls that the church service is 'dry' is corrected, that 
opinion will still obtain as it so often has, when they grow 
old enough to attend the regular service. 

(2) (3) 

In In 

Churches, Where a Churches That 
Sermonet for Boys Have Neither the 
and Girls Is Given Junior Church Serv- 
at the Regular Serv- ice nor the Sermonet, 
ice, 



(i) 
In 
Churches Having a 
Junior Church Serv- 
ice, 



D 



□ 



One out of Seven One out of Eleven One out of Twen- 

persons in the con- persons in the con- ty-one persons in the 

gregation were boys gregation were boys congregation were 

and girls under six- and girls under six- boys and girls under 

teen years of age. teen years of age. sixteen years of age. 

When they know that there is a service of their own, 
one that they can follow and understand all the way 
through, or when the preacher speaks to them specially for 
a short time, they do attend more regularly and in greater 
numbers. In one of the smaller churches, the minister's 
wife, who has charge of the Junior Church preaches to 
a larger congregation each Sunday than does her husband. 



THE JUNIOR CHURCH 19 

The attendance of boys and girls at the church service can 
be secured, if sought for in a reasonable way. 

That the Junior Church develops the church-going habit 
among boys and girls and binds them more intimately and 
permanently to the church has been the experience of 
practically all those preachers who have Junior Churches. 
"They become accustomed to the spirit and the mode of 
worship and are much better prepared to become members 
of the main congregation when they are a little older," 
said Dr. Lucius H. Bugbee of Christ Church, Pittsburg. 
Rev. J. Randolph Sasnett, Associate Pastor of the First 
Methodist Episcopal Church, Seattle, Washington, says, 
"Yes, we find that the Junior Church forms the church- 
going habit because it keeps them related to the church 
just at a time when so many drift away from the King- 
dom." 

"They feel that it is their own service," said Bishop 
H. Lester Smith, while pastor of the Central Methodist 
Episcopal Church, Detroit. "These boys and girls become 
just as loyal to their own Junior Church as the most loyal 
members of the adult congregation are to theirs." 

The Junior Church also develops the devotional side 
of the boy's and girl's religious nature, because its service 
is adapted to the religious and devotional needs. It is 
the graded public school idea applied to the church ser- 
vice. No educator would think of putting a boy of ten 
in a class of graduates at the university. Yet religious 
educators have sometimes come suspiciously near placing 
a kindergartner in the same service with the saintly, gray- 
haired Christian, whose long life of worship and service 
gives him a totally different religious background from 
that which the boy or girl possesses. 

The pure life of a child thrives on quite different spirit- 



20 THE JUNIOR CHURCH IN ACTION 

ual food from that which the more mature life needs, and 
it requires that this nourishment be prepared and pre- 
sented in quite a different way. To get the best results in 
Christian character and life, the boy or girl should have 
religious food that he or she can digest. 

The Junior Church gives opportunity for the expres- 
sion of this devotional spirit in a way that is perfectly 
natural. To see twelve-year-old boys and girls offering 
the morning prayer, leading in the reading of the psalter 
or the scripture lesson, making the announcements, or 
giving minute-man speeches on missionary subjects is a 
sight that means much for the church of to-morrow. Boys 
and girls are interested, as are adults, in that in which they 
participate. Just as the Junior League, the Junior Mis- 
sionary Societies, the departmentalized Sunday School 
and the graded public school meet the educational needs of 
boys and girls by adapting the subject matter and the 
method of presentation to those needs, just so the Junior 
Church performs a similar service for them in their church 
worship. 

Not least among the advantages of the Junior Church 
is the training in Christian service which it affords. This 
training is not of a scattering and promiscuous nature, 
but is directly along the lines of definite church work. 
At a time when the instinct for organization is rapidly 
developing in boys and girls, their activities in the Junior 
Church service and organization teach them the ways of 
the church in which they will soon take their places. "I'm 
a member of the Junior Church Official Board," one 
youthful enthusiast told her mother. 

As a training ground for effective, devoted members 
of the Christian Church of the future, the Junior Church 
has not an equal. 



THE JUNIOR CHURCH 21 

One of the by-products of the Junior Church, gratify- 
ing both to the pulpit and the pew, is that more parents 
are brought into the church. Every minister, more often 
than is pleasing, has heard the very real objection from 
mothers, "I would just love to come to church, and I do 
miss it so much, but I have no place to leave the children. 
They are so mischievous that I feel humiliated when they 
disturb others during the sermon." Although frequently 
an excuse, this is doubtless one of the prevalent causes 
for the absence of many parents from church. The Junior 
Church is not and never should be a nursery or a kinder- 
garten, — a mere place where children may be left. The 
nursery for the babies and the kindergarten for the tiny 
kiddies are no more a part of the Junior Church than 
they are of the Sunday School. 

Parents are just human enough to want to listen unin- 
terruptedly to the sermon, and those of the congregation 
who have no children are fully as human. Many of the 
churches having Junior Church services state that parents 
with children have frequently been brought back to reg- 
ular church attendance because of a convenient and profit- 
able place where their children may go during the service. 
And many cases have been noted where the interest of the 
boy or girl in the Junior Church has brought the parents 
to the regular service and into the church. The surest 
way to the heart of every parent is through the boy or 
the girl. 

The Junior Church is constantly and rapidly growing 
in favor and usefulness throughout the country. The 
following chapters will indicate the way to start a Junior 
Church, the service, the organization and the activities 
to the many who have been enquiring regarding these 
phases of the Junior Church work. 



CHAPTER II 
HOW TO START A JUNIOR CHURCH 

"How shall we start a Junior Church?" and "Where 
shall we begin?" are questions that arise immediately. 
The methods outlined have been chosen from among those 
which many Junior Churches have found to be most suc- 
cessful. From the plans of this chapter any pastor or 
worker can secure enough material to launch satisfactorily 
a junior service and organization. 

1. The whole Junior Church idea should be thought 
through thoroughly, and all plans carefully laid before 
any announcement is made. The place and the time of 
holding the service, the leadership, the order of service, 
and other items that will suggest themselves must be set- 
tled upon beforehand, if the greatest smoothness and 
success are to be attained. 

2. Many pastors have found that to give a five-minute 
sermonet at each morning service for perhaps a month or 
more before the first junior service popularizes the plan 
among the parents and secures their cooperation. The 
training of the person selected for the leadership of the 
junior congregation is not least among the advantages 
of such an arrangement. 

3. General announcement of the first service should be 
made two weeks before it opens, and special announcement 
on the Sunday preceding the first service, in the Sunday 
School, the church services, and in the Junior League. 

22 



HOW TO START A JUNIOR CHURCH 23 

Enlist the interest of the Sunday School teachers, asking 
them to announce it in their classes. 

4. An attractive poster placed in the vestibule of the 
church will attract many. 

5. During the week before the first service, postcards 
should be sent to all boys and girls in the congregation 
or Sunday School, inviting them to the first service. One 
or two dollars invested here will bring the most liberal 
returns. The receipt of a postcard or letter is an impor- 
tant event in the life of a boy or girl, and the sender shall 
in no wise lose his reward. 

A return postcard form, which secured seventy-six re- 
plies from one hundred and two cards mailed, is as fol- 
lows: 



THE JUNIOR CHURCH, 
CENTRAL METHODIST CHURCH 

Dear : 

Next Sunday we start the Junior Church, an in- 
teresting church service for boys and girls. I need 
you to help make it a success. You will like the 
sermonets on subjects like, "If I Were a Millionaire/' 
and "How a Shepherd Boy Became King." Some- 
times we will have lantern slides and pictures. Of 
course you will want to come and have the honor of 
being one of the charter or first members. Write your 
name on this return postal card at once, and drop 
it in the post office for me. I shall look forward to 
seeing you next Sunday at the regular church service. 
Our motto is "every boy and girl a member." 
Your good friend, 

Weldon F. Crossland. 



24 THE JUNIOR CHURCH IN ACTION 

(On the message side of the self-addressed return 
postal was the following:) 



Dear Mr. Crossland : 

I wish that you would put my name on the roll of 
charter or first members of the Junior Church of 
Central Methodist Church. 

I promise that I will attend just as often as I 
possibly can. 

Your friend, 

Name 

Address 



6. For each of the next four or five Sundays have 
some attractive feature planned, as for example any of 
the following: 

(a.) The signing of the charter by all the boys and 

the girls — a very impressive ceremony. 

Form and ceremony appeal strongly to boys 

and girls. 
(b.) The choosing of the choir, whether that be a 

quartet, a sextet or an octet, 
(c.) The selection and consecration of the Official 

Board. 
(d.) Announce the Junior Jolly for the following 

Saturday — a lively social affair of the Junior 

Church. 
(e.) The institution of the envelope system for offer- 
ing. 
(f.) The appointment of the ushers for the offering 

and for the distribution of the books. 



HOW TO START A JUNIOR CHURCH 25 

(g.) The awarding of a prize for the best essay 
brought on the subject of the previous Sun- 
day's sermonet. 

To say that the success or failure of the Junior Church 
depends on the leadership is not to overstate the situation. 
Is not the same true of any organization ? The best leader 
in the church is none too good for the junior congrega- 
tion. There is an idea, as prevalent as it is erroneous, 
that almost any one will do to take charge of boys and 
girls. The truth of the matter, however, is that the 
talented person in this phase of public speaking is even 
more rare than the able speaker to adults. 

The answer to the question, "Who lead the Junior 
Churches of the country?" shows that a suitable person 
to take charge of the Junior Church may be found in 
almost every church. 

"One of my consecrated school teachers leads our 
Junior Church," says one pastor. Another replies, "A 
good and competent woman." "My wife. She has one or 
two of the most spiritual people to assist," says Rev. L. 
M. Blakeley of River Rouge Methodist Church, who has 
one of the most successful Junior Churches in the coun- 
try. "The Associate Pastor," says another. "The 
Church House Director," "The Assistant Pastor," "The 
Deaconess," "My best Sunday School teacher," are among 
the many other replies. 

A church member that loves boys and girls and is loved 
by them ; one who understands them and who talks inter- 
estingly to them ; one who has a real religious experience 
and a deep love for the church — such a one can make the 
Junior Church THE force in the religious life of the boys 
and girls of any church. 



26 THE JUNIOR CHURCH IN ACTION 

Can every church have a Junior Church? Yes, or 
something that will be the next best thing. The lack of 
a separate room is the only difficulty that should stand be- 
tween any church and the Junior Church. The adequate 
leadership is there, and it is only a question of interesting 
and securing the right person. 

The larger churches, those of more than several hun- 
dred members, may easily have a Junior Church that 



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BOYS AND GIRLS 

Come and have a GOOD TIME 
with us at Central's 

Junior Church 

Every Sunday morning at 10:30 



COME NEXT SUNDAY 



Central Methodist Church 

Corner Woodward and Grand Circu* Park 



Two of these cards, carefully given to each member of the Junior 
Church on the promise that they will be given to two boys or girls 
with an invitation to attend, increased attendance sixty percent. 



has an attendance of from seventy-five to three hundred. 
That proportion of boys and girls attend Sunday School. 
The problem is to secure their attendance at the Junior 
Church service — a problem that has been found to be very 
easy of solution by a great many churches. The Garland 
Street Methodist Junior Church, Flint, under the leader- 
ship of LeRoy Schnell, had an attendance of well over 
three hundred. 

Many of the more enterprising Junior Churches have 
profitably divided the boys and girls who attend church 



HOW TO START A JUNIOR CHURCH 27 

into three groups, the Junior Church (boys and girls 
from six to fourteen or sixteen), the Kindergarten (ages 
three to five years) and the Nursery (all under two or 
three). The Kindergarten seeks to do for the very young 
boys and girls just what the Junior Church does for the 
older ones. The lessons are taught by means of the sand- 
pile, scissor work and other kindergarten material. One 
enterprising Kindergarten supervisor sent several dozen 
very interesting scrap-books that her boys and girls had 
made to the soldiers at Camp Custer. While neither the 
kindergarten nor the nursery are a part of the Junior 
Church, they have performed real service to both churches 
and parents, as well as affording an avenue of activity for 
some of the older Junior Church girls. 

Those churches which do not find it possible to main- 
tain a Junior congregation will still find it possible to use 
the sermonets at the morning service. A five-minute talk 
entirely to boys and girls as they sit with their parents 
will stimulate attendance. Dr. G. F. Shepherd of Asbury 
Church, Watertown, N. Y., says, "My second hymn Sun- 
day mornings is always for the children." The hundreds 
of pastors of all denominations who deliver short ser- 
monets to the junior members of their congregations 
often find that the adults enjoy these short discourses 
equally with the boys and girls. 

Practically all the Junior Churches are held at the hour 
of the regular morning worship. Between the two differ- 
ent times of holding the service, the minister wishing 
to start the Junior Church will of course choose for 
himself. In the former case, the boys and girls come 
into the regular service, stay for the hymns, the prayer, 
the Scripture reading, the offering and the anthem, pass- 
ing out quietly to their own service during the singing of 



28 THE JUNIOR CHURCH IN ACTION 

the hymn just before the sermon. This leaves thirty- 
five or forty minutes for their service. According to the 
other arrangement, the two services are contemporaneous, 
the boys and girls going directly to their own service, 
which opens at the same hour as the regular church 
service. 

The advantages claimed for the former type, which is 
perhaps the more prevalent, are : (i) It does not break 
up the family as a unit in Christian worship. (2) It 
leaves the boys and girls in the regular church service 
during that portion of the service from which they derive 
the greatest value — the hymns, the Bible reading, etc. 
(3) It ties the Junior Church to the regular church ser- 
vice, so that the transition from the Junior Church to the 
church service at the age of thirteen, fourteen or fifteen — 
in some churches later — is natural and easy. This plan 
is used in Central Church, Detroit. 

The advantages claimed for the other type of service 
are: (1) The entire service is adapted to the religious 
and devotional needs and capacities of the boys and girls. 
(2) Much more time is afforded for doing the special 
training that is desired. (3) The boys and girls feel 
that it is really their own service. The Wesley Methodist 
Church, Detroit, and many others have found the latter 
service to be unusually successful. 



CHAPTER III 
THE JUNIOR CHURCH SERVICE 

Those Junior Church services have been most success- 
ful that have followed as closely as possible the spirit 
and the order of the regular church service. By all means 
the junior service should have the denominational tone, 
for better Presbyterians, better Methodists or better Bap- 
tists are better Christians. To have a marked similarity 
between the Junior service and the regular service makes 
much easier the step from the one into the other. 

The elaborateness of the service will, of course, be 
determined by the length of the time at the leader's dis- 
posal. The following order of service, used by a number 
of the larger churches, with slight variations may be sug- 
gestive. 

i. The Doxology. (All the members standing.) 

2. Invocation or short prayer. (All remaining 

standing.) 

3. Hymn. (Led by the Junior Church Choir, a 

member of the regular church choir conduct- 
ing if one can be secured.) 

4. Memory Work. (The Ten Commandments, or 

the Beatitudes, or the Thirteenth chapter of 
I Corinthians, etc.) 

5. Hymn. 

6. Responsive Lesson. (Led by a boy or girl.) 

29 



30 THE JUNIOR CHURCH IN ACTION 

7. Prayer, closing with the Lord's Prayer. (Led 

either by the leader or by one or two boys or 
girls in voluntary prayers.) 

8. The Scripture Lesson. (Occasionally read by 

a boy or girl.) 

9. The Announcements. 

10. The Offering, with prayer either before or after 

the offering is taken. Anthem or special 
music during the offering. 

11. The First Sermonet. (Seven or eight minutes 

long, on some Bible subject.) 

12. A Hymn. (The congregation standing.) 



NO SLACKERS IN OUR ICE BOX 

During the month of July and August some 
churches have a vacation, but we, "The Junior 
Church of Garland Street," do not slack one bit; and 
we sure do get some busy. Everybody on their toes 
trying to get the young people out to our 9-week 
Chautauqua. A different speaker each Sunday. 
When people say if s too hot, this is what we tell them 
— Come to our ice box (the Junior church room) ; 
it's 3 feet in the ground and the coolest place in 
town. The refreshments we serve every Sunday 
morning are free. And the musical program — it's 
great ; our speakers bring a special message of inter- 
est to boys and girls. 

Just watch for our program each Sunday and 
you'll know what's going on in the Biggest, Best 
and Busiest place for boys and girls in Flint — The 
Junior Church of Garland Street. 



THE JUNIOR CHURCH SERVICE 31 

13. The Second Sermonet. (Seven or eight minutes 

long, on some general religious or inspira- 
tional topic. Missionary stories are always 
enthusiastically received. ) 

14. The Closing Hymn. 

15. Benediction, "The Lord watch between thee and 

me, while we are absent, one from another.' ' 
One of the fine features of the Junior service is the 
part taken in it by the boys and girls. To use them in 
the service whenever possible creates in them both an 
interest and a loyalty. For their own good as well as that 
of the service, they should participate whenever possible 
and desirable. 

They will, of course, constitute the choir, whether that 
be a quartet, a sextet or an octet. The pianist and the 
violinist or any other orchestral accompaniment the talents 
of the members may make possible will also be made up 
of boys and girls. Though most memory work should 
be conducted by the leader, the Apostles' Creed, the 
Twenty-third and the First Psalms and other familiar 
passages may well be led by one of the older boys or 
girls. The reading of the Psalter or the responsive les- 
sons and the offering of prayer have been found especially 
helpful in developing the religious and devotional spirit. 
The boys and girls will be enthusiastic over the giving of 
Junior Minute Man speeches on some missionary topic or 
over the preparation of essays on some phase of church 
or missionary work. The ushers will, of course, be chosen 
from among the boys and girls. 

In the Junior Church everybody sings. A Junior serv- 
ice in every church would mean that the congregational 
singing of to-morrow would be the highest order in 
volume and quality. The boys and girls love the best of 



32 THE JUNIOR CHURCH IN ACTION 

those hymns of the hymnal like "Onward, Christian 
Soldiers," "Stand Up, Stand Up for Jesus," "A Charge 
to Keep I Have," and scores of others. These hymns 
never grow old, though, of course, the thoughtful leader 
avoids letting the boys or girls wear out any song by 
singing it every other Sunday, as they will be inclined to 
do. The teaching of new hymns is one of the commend- 
able features of many of the services. Where the Junior 
service occupies the sermon hour, a member of the regular 
church choir will be happy to lead in the Junior Church 
singing, even to direct some of the special music, such 
as the anthem by the choir, solos or duets. The music 
can be made one of the truly delightful and helpful 
phases of the Junior service. 

The time of youth is richest in its possibilities for form- 
ing religious habits and beliefs. Although increased 
knowledge and the critical attitude may alter them later, 
the great fundamental truths that have been implanted in 
the boy's mind will often enable him to weather the storms 
of doubt that later assail him. The Junior service pro- 
vides for this training through the special memory work 
and other special features of the service. 

"At Maple Avenue M. E. Church, Terre Haute, we 
had the Ten Commandments, the Beatitudes, the Twenty- 
third Psalm, the First Psalm, the Books of the Old and 
New Testaments, the Names of the Prophets and disciples, 
the Apostles' Creed, a few of the great hymns and other 
features as part of our memory work," says A. E. 
Monger, now of the First Methodist Church of Sidney, 
Ohio. The stereopticon lantern, using slides now pro- 
vided by the mission boards of nearly all denominations, 
are popular among many junior workers for use in con- 
nection with the missionary sermonet. "I ask questions 



THE JUNIOR CHURCH SERVICE 33 

on the sermonet of the previous Sunday," says Dr. F. H. 
Butler, of Zoar M. E. Church, Philadelphia, Pa. "We 
have often dramatized some of the Bible Stories after 
the manner of the Passion Play. The Prodigal Son/ 
'The Good Samaritan' and 'The Meeting of Livingstone 
and Stanley' are among the more successful. The boys 
and girls learn the great truths of the Bible in this way 
as they do in few others," says LeRoy Schnell while at 
the Wesley Methodist Church, Detroit. For over four 
months the Central Methodist Junior Church enjoyed two 
excellent speeches each Sunday, one from a boy, the other 
from a girl, in connection with the Centenary drive for 
one hundred and five million dollars for missions. Special 
patriotic days, Easter and Christmas of the Christian 
Year, Boy Scout Day, when all Scouts are invited to come 
and sit as a unit, and other days of local or national in- 
terest have been found to be profitable. 

The fine worshipful spirit that should characterize all 
church services may be readily secured in the Junior Ser- 
vice, if especial attention is given to the devotional atti- 
tude of the boys and girls. The Junior service is no more 
of an entertainment than is the regular service. It is 
possible to have either the helpful and inspiring atmos- 
phere of some of the greater churches or the cheap and 
common spirit of the streets. The bowed head, the closed 
eyes and in many Junior Churches, the kneeling during 
prayer are of the greatest help in the cultivation of the 
devotional spirit in the service. 

One hundred boys and girls and excellent order during 
the service are two factors difficult for some minds to 
associate. But to have a hundred and fifty or two hun- 
dred, and to have the order as good as that of the regular 
church service is attainable if expected and insisted upon. 



34 THE JUNIOR CHURCH IN ACTION 

It depends on the leader and on the pleasant firmness with 
which he requires the best of order. In our church work 
we have been too much afraid of discipline. We have 
feared offending some boy or girl by speaking to him 
or by sending him out of the service, while we have per- 
mitted him to spoil the service for a number of others 
and generally to lower the tone of the meeting. The 
offending boy or girl will have more respect for the 
church if he cannot treat it like a gymnasium, and he will 
have more respect for those who do the work of the 
church if he finds that he cannot "run over" or take 
advantage of them. 

An excellent method for maintaining order, suggested 
by one Junior Church, is to have the members vote that 
no whispering or other disturbance be permitted. In case 
this rule is infringed upon, stop in the middle of the sen- 
tence you are speaking and look in his direction. The 
silence is awful, and more so to the offender than any one 
else. Try it. Some speakers to boys and girls make the 
mistake of trying to "talk down" the boy by talking 
louder. It can't be done. Excellent order can be easily 
attained if required and insisted upon^ 



CHAPTER IV 
THE SERMONETS 

Let no one think that it is an easy thing to talk to boys 
and girls. The idea entertained by some that the mere 
telling of a story or the giving of an extemporaneous talk 
"gets across" with them is entirely erroneous. Boys and 
girls are even more difficult to hold in a speech than adults 
partly because their power of attention is not so highly 
developed. It is as much a grievous fault to appear 
before them without proper preparation as it is to appear 
before the adult congregation without adequate prepara- 
tion. These same rules of helpfulness, interest and 
attendance that obtain in the adult congregation hold for 
the boys and girls. 

The range of subjects for sermonets is almost as wide 
as that for sermons. Those same great themes that 
Christians have loved for twenty centuries, are absorbing 
in their interest to boys and girls, if presented so that 
they can understand them. God, His goodness and His 
love; Jesus, His work, His mission and His teaching, the 
work and value of the Church, Missions at home and 
abroad, the problems of morals that concern them and 
many other great topics have been used with the greatest 
profit. These the boys and girls love as they do not the 
shallow or superficial talks that are so often offered as 
more attractive substitutes for the deeply religious ser- 
monets. The only posible way to hold their interest and 

35 



36 THE JUNIOR CHURCH IN ACTION 

secure their regular attendance is to give them something 
from the religion of Jesus Christ in every talk. 

The more general inspirational talks, which should 
always have a strong religious coloring or application, 
may be found in the games the girls and boys play, the 
duties they perform, and in God's out-of-doors. Jesus 
used the illustration of the farmer sowing wheat, the 
woman seeking the lost coin, the boy leaving home, the 
shepherd and his sheep and others equally homely that 
were more than familiar to his hearers. He picked up 
His sermon subjects and illustrations from the things 
of everyday life, and His method has not been improved 
upon. The traffic sign, "Keep to the Right," will have in 
it the possibilities of an excellent sermon for the Junior; 
Church speaker who uses the Masters method. 

As boys and girls think concretely instead of abstractly, 
the illustration is even more important to the sermonet 
than it is to the sermon. They are habitually thinking 
in pictures, and while they may forget the precept or 
general truth, they will long remember the example or 
illustration. An able discourse on goodness and helpful- 
ness will not be as productive of altruism as the mere 
reading of the story of the Good Samaritan. They can 
understand what you mean by a good man helping another 
who is hurt; they may understand what you mean when 
you speak of goodness and helpfulness. 

In no book is there a richer store of illustrations of 
loyal, generous, kind, brave, loving and daring people 
than in the Bible. Those examples from the Bible have 
the advantage of having the religious background, as 
illustrations from history do not often have. They love 
to hear, too, of the great heroes of which they know, 
both in national and church history. A vast wealth of 



THE SERMONETS 37 

Illustrative material is available through a little thought 
and effort. 

Doubtless those sermonets are remembered longest that 
have an object or some material to illustrate them. "An 
Unfortunate Piece of Cement" was used to illustrate a 
sermonet by Dr. I. B. Schreckengast, formerly of the First 
Methodist Church of University Place, now Chancellor 
of the Nebraska Wesley an University, who used an 
irregular, useless piece of cement that had the misfortune 
of getting wet during a night rain. He used it to illus- 
trate the danger of boys and girls being left out at night. 
One easily forgets the advice often given in talks on this 
subject, but one cannot forget the helpful lesson of that 
ugly piece of cement. The chief value of these objects 
is that when the boy or girl sees them again, he or she 
will frequently associate the lesson of the sermonet with 
the object. And in many cases they will seek their own 
and suggest them to their pastor, as one nine-year-old 
newsboy did a sermonet on "Safety First." 

The stereopticon lantern, in those churches that have 
them are unexcelled for sermonets on missions. The pic- 
ture stays after the precept fades. 

The language used in talking to boys and girls should 
be both simple and direct. One does not need "to talk 
down" to them as some are inclined to do. A great and 
equally prevalent danger is that of talking over their 
heads. All the great religious ideas can be and always 
should be expressed simply, as Jesus expressed them. One 
reason the children loved Him was that they could easily 
understand Him. They understand verbs and nouns 
rather than adverbs. Few statements prove a point to 
them as do familiar quotations from the Bible. On nearly 
every question, boys and girls are essentially open minded 



38 THE JUNIOR CHURCH IN ACTION 

with the result that belief and faith are easily created in 
their lives. 

The use of "boys and girls" instead of "children" when 
talking to them is eminently desirable both for the sake 
of the service and the boys and girls. If the Junior 
Church is called a Children's Church or if the impression 
is given out that "children" attend it, there will be few 
boys and girls attending of the ages of twelve and upward. 
The words "boys and girls" carry with them an older 
meaning that is equally applicable to the younger members 
of the junior congregation. To speak effectively to boys 
and girls one must forget that he or she is fifteen or 
twenty years older than most of the audience. Placing 
one's self in their place is an exceedingly difficult task, but 
a most refreshing one. Watch the boys and girls, note 
the words they use, and speak to them as if you were 
just one of them. 

The strong personal note should characterize the presen- 
tation of the sermonet. A directness and an intimate 
touch is possible here that the conventions of the regular 
service do not permit. Boys and girls like to be talked 
with, not merely talked to. Ask them many questions, 
not the rhetorical type that are used to create persuasion 
in the minds of one's hearers, but direct type that expects 
an answer. The boys and girls will put up their hands 
and answer, and those answers will be refreshing, some- 
times startling and occasionally astounding, both in what 
they reveal and in what they conceal. Boys and girls 
like to talk, as do other folks, and you have their interest 
in a moment if you ask them a question. 

The thoughtful leader will insist that those answers be 
to the point and definite, for in the majority of cases they 
will at first be true but colorless. In reply to the question, 



THE SERMONETS 39 

"What did Jesus do while he was here that we also 
should do?" the usual answer would be, "He did good." 
That same boy or girl should be asked, "Well, how did He 
do good?" "By helping other people." "What other 
people did He help ?" "A blind man." "So you know the 
story of how He helped one blind man?" etc. The So- 
cratic method achieves the desired results. In the boy's 
and girl's religious expression there is a certain indefinite- 
ness that is not found on the playground. This is neither 
necessary nor desirable. Questions clarify the boy's ideas 
on religion, teach him to think on religious questions and 
are especially valuable to the speaker in showing him the 
adequacies and the inadequacies of the religious lives of 
those whom he serves. The question is a very excellent 
means of religious diagnosis. 

One or two of the brighter members of the junior con- 
gregation will desire to monopolize the conversation, a 
condition which of course will be avoided. 

The length of the sermonet is limited by the duration 
of attention of the boys and girls, the ability of the speaker 
to speak interestingly to them and the time at his disposal. 
They range all the way from six to twenty minutes, with 
good success. Many Junior Church workers feel that two 
short sermonets, each eight or ten minutes in length, are 
better than one long one, both because of the attention of 
the boys and girls and the added opportunity for pre- 
senting an additional subject. Local conditions will, of 
course, determine which method produces the better re- 
sults. 



CHAPTER V 

ONE HUNDRED AND ELEVEN SERMONET 
SUBJECTS 

The hearty response from the many ministers through- 
out the country to the question, "Would you kindly give 
the titles of four or five of your best sermonets, with the 
central thought of each," has made possible the following 
liberal list of sermonet titles. They come from Washing- 
ton and Florida, Texas and Maine and many points be- 
tween. The arrangement into ' 'General Inspirational," 
"Old Testament," "New Testament," and "Church His- 
tory" has made impossible the giving of credit to those 
who suggested them. None of them, so far as known, is 
copyrighted, so any that are helpful may be used. As 
some of the titles were accompanied by no explanation, 
the reader can frame an excellent one for himself. 

GENERAL INSPIRATIONAL 

1. Youth's Capital. 

2. Pay Your way. — Beauty, comfort, goodness, re- 

sult of effort of mind and body. 

3. Odds and Ends. 

4. Good and Bad Trades. 

5. The Talking Stars. — Based on the Church 

Service Flag, suggesting unselfish living. 

6. The Magnet.— Christ's Holding Power. 

7. Little Foxes — the Bane of Small Sins. 

40 



SERMONET SUBJECTS 41 

8. Who Won the War? Prayer Life of great lead- 

ers in the World War and stories of boys who 
made the Supreme Sacrifice. 

9. Drafted for Service. 

10. The Alarm Clock of Conscience. 
II a A Very Poor Rich Man and a Very Rich Poor 
Man. Midas and Lazarus. 

12. Be Prepared. Preparing for the work we have 

to do. 

13. The Game of Tag. We are tagged "Pleasant," 

"Honest," "A Good Christian," by other 
folks. 

14. Follow the Leader. Following Jesus. 

15. Indelible Ink. The lasting effect of everything 

we do and think. 

16. A Good Shot. Effect of cigarette on the nerves, 

eyesight, etc., of a marksman. 

17. How Near God Is. In nature, in conscience, etc. 

18. What Are We Worth. In money, in influence, 

to other folks. 

19. A Gold Brick. Getting what seems to be best 

for what is the best. 

20. Obeying the Law. The need and reward of 

obeying God's laws. 

21. Danger Signals. The warning of parents, the 

teaching of the Bible, the voice of conscience. 

22. The Unfortunate Piece of Cement. 

23. Christians Are Patriots. 

24. Rolling Stones. 

25. The Work of an Engineer. 

26. I-Can-and-I-Will Folks. 
2J. Doing Your Duty. 

28. Team Work. 



42 THE JUNIOR CHURCH IN ACTION 

29. How to Grow in Body, Mind and Soul. 

30. Good Soldiers of Jesus Christ. 

31. Doing the Right Thing in the Right Way. 

32. How Shall I Care for God's Temple. Sermonet 

on the care of the body. 

33. Heart Rooms. 

34. The Fruitful Life. 

35. Satan's Chain Gang. 

36. Spending Money for That Which Is Not Bread. 

(Bread with articles hid in it.) 

37. Two Bears. — Bear and Forbear. 

38. Cracked Prayers. — A cracked shell with the 

Lord's Prayer on it. 

39. A Worm and a Butterfly. God's way of bring- 

ing beauty out of ugliness. 

40. The Echo — reaction of conduct and spirit. 

41. Scattered Feathers. — Effect of our words. 

42. What is That to Me? The claim of need upon 

us. 

43. The Two Countries. Fitting for the Land of 

Happiness. 

44. Doing My Best, Sir. 

45. Growing Straight. 

46. Do It Now — Obedience. 

47. The Biggest Thing. Fear God and keep His 

Commandments. 

48. The Fountain of Youth. Ponce de Leon. "The 

water that I shall give him shall be in him a 
well of water springing up into everlasting 
life." 

49. Rally Round the Flag. Loyalty to our country. 

50. God in the War* 



SERMONET SUBJECTS 43 

51. Why We Are Here. To serve God and to live 

as Jesus did. 

52. Planting a Garden. Only that which we plant 

will grow. 

53. Going With the Crowd. The danger of doing 

things that are wrong because others do them. 

54. How a Great Fire Started. The Chicago Fire. 

55. Our Business is Moving; 

56. A New Start. Every morning begins a new day 

in which to do God's will. 

57. The Unsinkable Ship. Unsinkable lives. 

58. The Chinese Idol. "I will do, see, speak no evil." 

Christ says "I will do good." 

59. "I Will Sometime" Folks. Folks who put off 

doing right and being Christians. 

60. Diving for Pearls. 

61. Losers and Winners. 

62. A Clean Plate. 

63. "Acres of Diamonds." 

64. Up-HillWork. 

OLD TESTAMENT 

1. How God Speaks to Us Through the Bible. 

Some of God's messages through the inspired 
men of the Bible. 

2. Gideon Ironsides. — Stories of Gideon's band, the 

possibilities under proper leadership. 

3. God's Care for Those Who Love Him. — How 

He Led the Children of Israel. 

4. The Shepherd Boy Who Became King. — 

David. 

5. How a Great King Lost His Crown. — Saul. 



44 THE JUNIOR CHURCH IN ACTION 

6. The Man Who Ran Away from His Duty 

(Jonah). 

7. The Girl Who Helped Naaman. 

8. The Wisest Man of the Old Testament- 

Solomon. 

9. The Man Whom the Ravens Fed — Elijah. 

10. The Herdsman Who Became a Preacher — Amos. 

11. The Patience of Job. 

12. The Strong Man Who Was Weak — the tragic 

story of Samson. 

13. How a Great Jew Saved His Country — Isaiah. 

14. Oh, King, Live Forever. — Daniel's stand for 

the Right. 

15. How a Woman Saved Her Country (Deborah). 

16. Absalom, an Ungrateful Son. 

17. Returning Good for Evil — Joseph and His 

Brothers. 

18. Jeremiah, the Prophet of Tears. 

19. The Brave Queen Esther. 

20. "Good Friends." David and Jonathan. 

21. The George Washington of the Jews. — Moses. 

THE NEW TESTAMENT 

1. The Boy with the Lunch Basket. (Feeding of 

the Five Thousand. How God can use small 
things to bless many people.) 

2. Vine and Branches. (Use a grape vine as an 

illustration. ) 

3. The Unselfishness of Jesus. 

4. Lights of the World. Story of Jesus, also using 

different kinds of candles for different kinds 
of people. 



SERMONET SUBJECTS 45 

5. My Hero — Stories of Heroes culminating with 

Jesus. 

6. Peter, the Defender of the Faith. 

7. A Dream and Christian Missions. (Paul's re- 

sponse to the appeal, "Come over into Mace- 
donia and help us.") 

8. The Roman Roads. 

9. The Story of Shipwreck. (Paul's journey to 

Rome and how God saved him from death. ) 

10. A Runaway Slave. (Book of Philemon.) 

11. The Policeman Who Was Converted. (Paul's 

jailer. 

12. The First Martyr. (Stephen.) 

13. The Bravery of Jesus. (Money changers in the 

Temple.) 

14. Jesus, the Good Citizen. 

15. Luke, a Christian Doctor. 

16. What Love Is. (I Corinthians 13.) 

17. Jesus' Idea of Money Grabbing. (Lay not up 

for yourselves treasures. ) 

18. Occupations of New Testament Men, the Chris- 

tian Business Man. 

19. The Beauty of the Lilies. (Easter story.) 

CHURCH HISTORY 

1. A Series of Church Heroes. 

2. Augustine, the Saint. 

3. The Founder of Our Church. 

4. Luther, the Pioneer. 

5. The Work of John Huss. 

6. John Calvin. 

7. Savonarola. 



CHAPTER VI 
THE JUNIOR CHURCH ORGANIZATION 

All Junior Church organization has wisely been and 
should be along denominational lines. The members are 
being trained for service in some particular church and 
the lines of organization and activity should follow the 
denominational plan as closely as is possible. They need 
not be so elaborate, in fact the desirable method of pro- 
cedure is to begin simply, and to add plans as they are 
needed or as the development of the abilities and activities 
of the boys and girls demands. One part should, of 
course, be well started and working smoothly before 
another is launched. 

That boys and girls will take responsibility to a sur- 
prising degree in the Junior Church is the experience of 
all Junior Church workers. "I let the boys and girls 
plan the features, giving them the proper direction/ ' says 
one successful junior pastor. The office-holding instinct 
is strong in them from the age of ten to sixteen, and both 
for the love of their church and the pride in themselves, 
they will take their duties quite as seriously and often as 
effectively as do the members of the adult congregation. 
Often their willingness is refreshing. The successful 
worker lets them know that they are expected to do the 
work, and they will do it. In one Junior Church, during 
the months of January, February, March and April, two 
Junior Church "minute men" (of both sexes) appeared 

46 



THE JUNIOR CHURCH ORGANIZATION 47 

each Sunday according to a fixed schedule. Only two 
during the four months failed to appear, one because of 
sickness and the other because he had lost the notes for; 
his speech. Their places were taken by substitutes, whom 
the efficient Minute Man chairman, a girl of thirteen, kept 
in readiness. 

To hold an official office either as a member of the 
Board of Trustees, of the Board of Stewards, or Presby- 
ters in the Junior Church is an honor of which the boys 
and girls elected are always justly proud. The Zoar M. E„ 
Junior Church of Philadelphia has both trustees and 
stewards and find the plan excellent in training boys and 
girls who will sometime ho!3 official positions in the regu- 
lar church organization. Rev. L. M. Blakely of the River 
Rouge Methodist Church, Michigan, says: "In our 
Junior Church we have junior stewards who are members 
in good standing of the Official Board. To this body they 
bring their reports. We have a treasurer, and a treasurer 
of benevolences, with a financial secretary of current ex- 
penses and also a secretary of benevolences." 

The junior officials transact all Junior Church business, 
as do the adults, discuss the questions that come before 
them, make suggestions, and make and pass motions on 
matters that to them are just as important as any could 
be to the regular official board. Though their service 
for the kingdom may be of the proportions of the widow's 
mite, it is done for their Lord and Master, and in no way 
loses its reward. The regular committees, the Social, 
Membership and Attendance, Music, Service and Finance, 
afford the best possible training ground for those who will 
contribute their talent to The Greater Church of To- 
morrow. 

Those Junior Churches that plan to have junior mis- 



48 THE JUNIOR CHURCH IN ACTION 

sionary societies after the manner of the Woman's Home 
Missionary Society and the Woman's Foreign Missionary 
Society, cannot do better than to use those junior organi- 
zations already established, the Home Guards and the 
King's Heralds for the older boys and girls, or the 
Mothers' Jewels and the Little Light Bearers for the 
younger ones. The fact that they are affiliated with a 
national organization will make their work of a higher 
order and of a more permanent character. The Wesley 
Methodist Junior Church of Detroit boasts of a Junior 
Church Guild that did considerable sewing for the Red 
Cross, as was done by so many of the public schools 
throughout the country. The Christian Church with an 
almost unwise altruism has permitted many other organi- 
zations to capitalize that spirit of generosity and helpful- 
ness which she has had such a large part in creating. A 
stronger church and a more lasting loyalty to the church 
would be the result of directing more of that spirit of 
helpfulness along church service lines. 

The grouping of the boys and girls into sections with 
leaders or captains — the old Methodist Class Meeting 
Idea — has been found exceedingly helpful to the Wesley 
Methodist Church. It has both increased the attendance 
and improved the service. The captains, elected by each 
of the groups, report the percentage of their groups there, 
and at the following Sunday service either produce the 
absent member or give an acceptable excuse for his ab- 
sence. Frequently these groups present a dramatization 
of some of the Bible Stories, or have charge of a portion 
of the Junior service. 

Boys and girls love to give to the church, and will give 
exceedingly liberally if they know for what their money 
is to be spent and if a workable plan is devised to make 



THE JUNIOR CHURCH ORGANIZATION 49 

their giving systematic. In one Junior Church, some of 
the regular contributors among the boys and girls are 
giving more money per Sunday than some of the regular 
contributors among the adults. The penny offering should 
be largely dispensed with, in a few cases it should be 
doubled, but in the large majority of the cases should be 
supplanted by the nickel or the dime offering. That is 
certainly not too much to expect, for many boys and girls 
spend an average of a nickel a day for candy, ice cream 
and the motion pictures. The habit and practice of tithing 
should be started in the Junior Church. The boy's and 
girl's interest in the church will in most cases be com- 
mensurate with what he or she invests there. 

For a Junior Church to raise one hundred dollars for 
home missions in four months seems a rather unusual 
achievement. Yet the boys and girls of the Central 
Methodist Junior Church paid in that full amount for 
Italian mission work in Detroit. The plan was, "A dime 
for every year we've lived. It's worth it," and after the 
boys and girls had finished paying the eight, ten or twelve 
weekly offerings of a dime each, they had so formed the 
habit that they continued to place in their weekly envelopes 
their customary offering. They had grown to enjoy giv- 
ing to the Lord for His work. 

Boys and girls like mottoes, emblems and badges. The 
more badges or buttons a boy has on the lapel of his coat, 
the more pleased and proud he is. A neat Junior Church 
pin or badge may be designed and procured for a very 
moderate price. It represents one of the best pieces of 
publicity the Junior Church has. Every boy and girl in 
the church will want to wear one. A motto that was sug- 
gested is, "For Christ and Church." A Junior 

Church banner to stand beside the Stars and Stripes makes 



50 THE JUNIOR CHURCH IN ACTION 

more definite the Junior Church idea in the minds of the 
newer boys and girls. 

Many Junior Churches have chosen "Stand Up, Stand 
Up for Jesus" as their official hymn, while others have as 
their favorite, "Onward, Christian Soldiers." As boys 
and girls like to yell, and usually have school yells, one 
for the Junior Church is not at all out of place — to be 
used at the Junior Jolly or on a sleigh ride — never, of 
course, at the church service. 



THE JUNIOR CHURCH ORGANIZATION 51 



THE GARLAND STREET METHODIST JUNIOR 
CHURCH BULLETIN 

Sermon to-day — "Planting the Seed." 

Mr. Schnell's sermon for next Sunday will be "Wild Animals I 
Have Met." 

Attendance last Sunday 340; collection $58.74. Not bad for a 
rainy Sunday. 

The new train crew sure did hit 'em up some. Transue with his 
$8.35 collection looked good. 

There will be no meeting of the Boys' Brotherhood and the Girls' 
Aid Society this afternoon. 

And still that choir leads the girls in collection. What do you 
think of little Bixby with a collection of $6.40? 

Mr. Schnell would like to have all the Boys and Girls stop in the 
office some time this week — any evening after school. 

We are still selling fresh country eggs at market prices. Last 
week we sold 400 dozen; one boy alone sold over a 100 dozen. He 
sure was going some. 

We will organize our different sections into the Brotherhood and 
Aid Society this week, and then we will be ready to have some 
"hikes." The older boys and girls have been organized for the 
past 4 weeks. 

Box social Monday evening from 4 to 6 p. m. For Mary Rich's, 
Louise Booth's, John Toomey's and Ronald Buck's sections. The 
girls will bring small boxes with light lunch. The boys will bring 
10 cents. 

We are getting ready for our winter picnic as we think our train 
and boat contest will be over to-day. The picnic will be given in four 
sections — the smaller folks after school and the larger folks in the 
evening. 

Here is something funny. See if you can explain it. The girls 
say they will win the contest to-day because the train ran into an 
©pen switch and was wrecked and the Boys say they will win be- 
cause the Boat was submarined. Who is right? 

Listen to this — The largest yet. Boys' collection: Pailthorp's, 
$1.26; Bixby's, $6.40; Toomey's, $2.80; Buck's, 51c; Transue's, 
$8.35; Garner's, $3.00;' Dimond's, $2.16; Richard's, $5.30. Total, 
$29.78. 

Girls' collection: Ryan's, $1.00; Moore's, $3.00; Rich's, $6.47; 
Booth's, $7.50; Latham's, 53c; Wilson's, $1.36; Frazier's, $5.00; 
Bisbing's, $348. Total, $28.86. 

This bulletin is printed on page four of the regular 
weekly calendar. 



52 THE JUNIOR CHURCH IN ACTION 

While only the larger churches may find it possible to 
issue a newspaper for the Junior Church, entitled "The 
Junior News," the publication itself has an unusual value 
in stimulating interests and in increasing attendance. Dr. 
William L. Stidger, pastor of St. Mark's Methodist Epis- 
copal Church, Detroit, while in charge of the First Metho- 
dist Church, San Jose, California, assisted his Junior 
Church in issuing a monthly newspaper. The cost is not 
at all prohibitive, for by using a mimeograph or a multi- 
graph, two hundred copies could be run off at a cost of 
less than a dollar* 



CHAPTER VII 
THE JUNIOR CHURCH ACTIVITIES 

To preach service as a Christian privilege and obliga- 
tion and not to provide the opportunity or direction for 
that service is to do a somewhat unreasonable thing. A 
great deal of this has been done among boys and girls as 
well as among men and women. The value of serving to 
the religious life of boys and girls especially is hardly 
to be overestimated, for except perhaps for singing, it is 
the most natural expression of that happy generous spirit 
that characterizes their religious life. The rich teaching 
they have received through their Sunday School and home 
is made definite and is crystallized by the work, however 
unimportant, for their Lord and Master. "In the Junior 
Church, we always do what we are asked, if we are able," 
easily becomes a rule to be gladly obeyed among the boys 
and girls. 

The doing of things is instinctive with boys and girls, 
whether that be the keeping of store, playing at soldier- 
ing or the doing of work for the church. No better foun- 
dation for the life service appeal may be laid than is laid 
through the preaching and the serving activities of the 
Junior Church. To enlist in work for the church they 
have been so happily serving is the natural and the easy 
thing for them to do. In one Junior Church four of the 
older boys and three of the older girls have definitely de- 
cided to go into Christian work 

53 



54 THE JUNIOR CHURCH IN ACTION 

The activities in which Junior Church members may 
engage are as numerous and varied as the work of the 
church. Church attendance is always equally important 
with church membership. The Attendance and Member- 
ship Contest has always had excellent results when prop- 
erly conducted and adequately followed up. The contest 
idea strongly appeals to boys and girls, who will work dili- 
gently to bring in their friends. From the Methodist 
Book Concern may be secured buttons, red and blue, which 
have "Brought One" printed on them. These have greatly 



BR0UGHt , l fBR^HT 



one A Lone 



IS THE RED-AND-BLUE CONTEST OBSOLETE? 

Junior Church boys and girls say "NO!" Every youngster likes 
to wear a button, and will work long hours inviting his friends 
for the sake of beating "the other side" as well as the reward of 
a lapel covered with buttons. 

stimulated several Junior Church contests, each boy or girl 
being awarded one for having brought a new member. 

Another Junior pastor makes an excellent suggestion. 
He asks each boy or girl to give him the name and address 
of one of his best boy or girl friends, who does not attend 
Junior Church or Sunday School. The pastor promises 
to send a postcard or letter of invitation to that prospective 
member, provided the boy or girl will invite that friend 
during the coming week and call at his home for him the 
following Sunday morning. To have the new members 
stand, with those who brought them, and to give them a 



THE JUNIOR CHURCH ACTIVITIES 5s 

hand-clasp makes them feel that the welcome they have 
received is more cordial. 

Dr. A. A. Brooks of the First Methodist Church, Fort 
Dodge, Iowa, says, "We keep up our attendance and se- 
cure new members by visitation and invitation." "By 
various forms of publicity, contests, but mostly by per- 
sonal work," says Dr. A. E. Monger of First Church, 
Sidney, Ohio. Rev. J. Randolph Sasnett, associate pastor 




1 

to the 

Garland St 
JUNIOR 
tCH 

I was there- 
it's great 



JUNIOR CHURCH TAG DAY 

Three hundred of these Junior Church Tags increased the at- 
tendance of the Garland Street Junior Church fifty percent 

of First Church, Seattle, Washington, whose Junior 
Church has an average attendance of one hundred and 
fifty, speaks from experience when he says, "By making 
every service interesting and worth while. It is a service 
the boys and girls are glad to attend. Rewards and con- 
tests are used also. Sporadic efforts and contests calcu- 
lated to result in an anti-climax are studiously avoided." 

While boys and girls are not especially fond of writing 
essays, they will willingly do so on the sermonet of any 



$6 THE JUNIOR CHURCH IN ACTION 

given Sunday, especially if they know that a prize is to 
be awarded. They like the idea of a contest, as well as 
the possibility of securing the prize. While some of the 
literary gems are not exactly verbatim reports of what 
the pastor said, they will show to quite an extent what 
the boys and girls received from his talk. The prizes may 
well be a pocket Testament or a book like one of the 
series of "The King's Highway." 

Mr. Schnell, while at Wesley Methodist Church, 
worked the church and community service ideas among 
the Junior Church members as thoroughly as perhaps 
any one in the country. He appointed a captain over 
each block within a half a mile of the church, and not a 
new family moves into the community of which captain 
does not know. He reports it immediately to Mr. Schnell. 
The distribution of 6,000 pieces of literature during a 
week, and the continuance of that record for a period 
of seven or eight weeks is another accomplishment of his 
boys and girls. He urges them strongly to bring their 
parents to service with them. 

Preparing Christmas baskets for the needy of the com- 
munity, the taking of a special offering occasionally for 
some special cause, and cooperating with the city in all 
movements like the Red Cross, are other ways of Chris- 
tian service, which boys and girls enjoy. 

The coming generation will know much more about 
missions than does the present one. In part at least this 
will be the case, because, in addition to hearing more about 
missions, they will have the opportunity of doing some 
definite service for missions. Like their elders, they will 
give something for missions, but will give twice as much 
for a definite individual missionary undertaking. "For 
Little Italy in Detroit," the boys and girls of the Junior 



THE JUNIOR CHURCH ACTIVITIES 57 



THE JUNIOR CHURCH 

ITALIAN THERHONETER 

* F~ Little ITALY In Detroit 



v e 



T 
H 

E 

T 
o 

-P 

B 
Y 

X 

s 



Watch 
It Go 



'95 

'75 



'*5I 



r 3i> 



*Z5\ 



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F 100 



1^90 



[30 



20 



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feo o 

p 

i 



Holp 



A DIME FOR 
EVERY YEAR WE'VE UVED 



THE ITALIAN THERMOMETER 



A successful experiment in juvenile missionary giving. Over one 
hundred dollars was the total gift of the Central Junior Church 
members during a period of four months. 



58 THE JUNIOR CHURCH IN ACTION 

Church gave over one hundred dollars. Each member 
gave ten cents for each year he or she had lived, and 
made the contribution each Sunday until the amount was 
paid. The money was spent for work among the boys 
and girls of one of the Italian sections of Detroit. 

To support an orphan in some Methodist Children's 
Home ; to equip a room there or to support a missionary, 
or to maintain a scholarship for some Chinese boy or girl, 
appeals irresistibly to the generous impulses of all boys 
and girls. 

The church is rapidly realizing an unused asset of the 
greatest value in the social instincts of the individual and 
of the community. That play and recreation can be used 
for the glory of God and the building of His Kingdom 
has been the unanimous experience of institutional 
churches. In boys and girls especially is this play instinct 
highly developed. The Junior Jolly, the monthly social 
affair of the Junior Church, satisfies and directs that in- 
stinct in an unusually gratifying way, bringing together 
as a unit most of the boys and girls of the congregation. 

"Our Junior Jollies are carefully planned, with some- 
thing doing every minute," is as good a recipe for a suc- 
cessful junior social affair as can be found. The Junior 
Churches of the country have auto rides, house parties, 
truck rides, lawn parties, hikes, social hours in the church, 
motion picture entertainments, stereopticon slides, out- 
ings, story telling at the informal gatherings, boat rides. 
The first Saturday of every month is the regular date 
set by some churches for their Junior Jollies. Others have 
their affairs coincide with the great days of the year, a 
New Year's party, one on Washington's Birthday, on 
April Fool's Day, on May Day and Decoration Day, on 
the Fourth of July, and other occasions that will readily 



THE JUNIOR CHURCH ACTIVITIES 59 

suggest themselves. To have a program appropriate to 
the day adds attractiveness to the affair and avoids the 
sameness which is liable to characterize the regular pro- 
grams. 

To have the program composed entirely of numbers by 
the boys and girls both enlists their interest and trains 
them. The piano solos, the readings, the solos, and the 
playlets by the Boy Scouts or the Campfire Girls have 



Jsr 


girl 14 years of 
e games, motion 
lurch Tarty, next 
anuary 26 

Pi CROSSLAND. 
' PASTOR 


BOYS AND GIRLS!! 




GAMES 


i1 £ 


Free Movies and a Treat 


g 1: 


iy boy 01 
d, to th 
Junior CI 
i» p. in. 1 
ELDON 1 

SSISTANl 


For YOU on next 




Saturday, January IS? at 2.30 P. ML 


3S U * 5 < 


If you do not go to any other Sunday School, the boys and 


«s □ 


*S€« . 


gfris of Central's Junior Church invite you to their Junior Jolly 


S 2 3 




Party next Saturday afternoon. You will have heaps of fun 


«»i 


/..\5 


playing games with us in the gymnasium. You will like the 


i=-l 


funny movies and the refreshments (ice cream) too. A picture 


^« «E 


^**1 


of all the boys and girls present will be taken. Be sure to come 


^* * z 


1 sT 1 


and have a good time with us. Come in yotrr school clothes. 


P I 5 


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Your friends. 


is 8 


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THE 150 BOYS AND C1RLS OP THE 


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JUNIOR CHURCH AND SUNDAY SCHOOL 


S 

9 


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CENTRAL METHODIST CHURCH 


WOODWARD AND ADAMS IENTRANCE 3 ADAMS EAST) 



EVERYBODY LIKES AX INVITATION! 



been very creditably done by juniors themselves. Where 
funds are available for advertising or the printing of 
tickets, the attendance can be almost doubled. 

The Junior Jolly, as all other social affairs, should never 
be considered as an end in itself. As a means of recruit- 
ing for the Junior Church and Sunday School, it has been 
found to be unusually effective. Each boy or girl will 
promise to bring another boy or girl, and some of them 
will bring half a dozen. The Junior Jolly has often been 



60 THE JUNIOR CHURCH IN ACTION 

a door of entrance to Sunday School and church mem- 
bership. 



SLEIGH RIDE FOR BOYS AND GIRLS 

Any boy or girl attending the Garland Street 
Junior Church Sunday morning and who will bring 
this card with them, will have it punched for the 
sleigh ride Monday evening. The sleigh will leave 
the Garland Street Church every hour. 

3 130 You ride at the hour 4 -.30 

punched 
5:30 7:30 6:30 

BRING THIS CARD AND 5C MONDAY EVENING 



So rapidly have Junior Churches sprung up throughout 
the whole country, and so effective have they become in 
doing for boys and girls what the regular service and 
organization do for the adults, that one would not need 
to be a prophet to predict that sometime the Junior 
Church will be a part of the regular church organization 
and have its place in church economy. 



TWENTY SERMONETS 



PART TWO 



GOOD ROADS 

Text: "The Way of the Transgressor is Hard." Proverbs XIII, 

IS. 

Illustrative Material: A Good Roads Automobile Map. 

Did you ever see a monument that was three thousand 
three hundred and twelve miles long? You know the 
one that was erected in honor of George Washington is 
very tall, five hundred and fifty-five feet — nearly two 
blocks long. It is very beautiful, but it's not so useful 
as the one I have in mind. I'm thinking of The Lincoln 
Highway, which stretches from New York City to San 
Francisco. Hundreds of thousands of automobiles use it 
every month, and although some parts of it are still 
pretty rough, it is the best long road in the world. Don't 
you think it was a fine thing to build that kind of a monu- 
ment to a man who had built the good road of freedom 
for two and one-half million slaves ? I do. 

You have all been riding in an automobile over rough 
roads, haven't you? You bounced and jolted and when 
the car hit a hard bump you had to hang on to keep from 
hitting your head on the top of the car. It wasn't a bit 
of fun, was it? You have also ridden over the smooth 
pavement of the city and enjoyed the ride. For a road 
to be called good, it must be smooth and free from ruts. 
It must be safe, too, for a road that has big holes at 
the side or has its bridges washed out would not be a 
good one. 

63 



64 THE JUNIOR CHURCH IN ACTION 

Did you know that our Church is building good roads ? 
Oh, no, not the kind your father uses when he drives his 
car, but the roads along which folks walk as they live. 
There used to be a road that had this sign on it, "To 
Slavery." Not many white folks took that road, because 
they did not like it. But millions of black men and women 
were driven into that road that was so hard and rough. 
Because of the long hours they worked and the hot 
sun, many of them could not walk along the slavery road 
for more than four or five years. But Christian people 
saw the slavery of the Negro and said, "This sin must 
stop/' and to-day a "Road Closed" sign hangs on the 
slavery road. 

Lately the Church has helped to close another danger- 
ous road which caused more sorrow and death than did 
even the Slavery Road. That road had on its sign-post, 
"To the Saloon." It looked very pleasant at the beginning, 
because there were lights and many well-dressed folks at 
the entrance. But those who went a little further on that 
Saloon Road found that they became poorer, that they 
lost most of their good name, that all of their true friends 
were no longer with them. Further down that road they 
found that they neglected their homes, that they took the 
money they should have spent for food and clothing for 
their children and used it for drink, and that further 
still the road began to run down hill, and that they could 
hardly stop themselves, and that all those who had gone 
before them had fallen and lay still as death. Many, 
many millions of men and women have gone that Saloon 
Road, and none of them has ever been happy as long as 
they traveled it. The Church of Jesus Christ said, "This 
awful sin must stop," and to-day we have a "Road Closed" 
sign hung over the saloon. 



GOOD ROADS 65 

"The Cigarette Road" will some day be closed, as will 
other roads that are harming people who travel them. 

The church in which we are to-day is the greatest good 
road builder in the world. We have built a road even 
to the center of Africa, another to West China, another 
to Alaska, another to India, and to all parts of the world. 
How happy are those people when we bring them the 
good news of God and of His Son, Jesus. We take them 
the Bible, the school book and some medicine, for they 
know very little about any of those things before our 
missionaries come to them. The natives of Central Africa 
used to go on the war path or the war road. Where they 
once held their cannibal feasts they now attend Church 
services or have their Sunday Schools or day schools. 
They are learning to be doctors and teachers and preach- 
ers; in other words, good road builders. Throughout 
all the world, wherever the good news of Jesus has been 
preached, folks have been made better, women and chil- 
dren have been made happier and good roads for folks 
to walk along have been built. 

I could tell you of a great many other good roads that 
the Christians of the world have built to make it as hard 
as possible for folks to go wrong and as easy as possible 
for them to go the right road. Jesus Christ is our great 
guide on the road we should travel. The Bible is the 
great Guide Book or Good Road Map, which will keep 
us from going wrong, if we follow it. The Christian Way 
of living is the Great Good Road. Those who follow it 
are happy in serving God. The Christian Church is the 
great body of good folks who are following the Great 
Leader on the Great Good Road. They are all with songs 
of gladness going toward that Holy City, where they will 



66 THE JUNIOR CHURCH IN ACTION 

always be with God and serve Him after they leave this 
world. 

Prayer. Dear Lord, help us to keep off the bad roads 
that lead away from Thee and to keep on the good roads 
that lead to Thee and to Heaven, for Jesus' sake. Amen. 



II 

IF I HAD A MILLION DOLLARS 

Text: "What Shall it Profit a Man if He Gain the Whole World 

and Lose His Own Soul." Mark VIII, 36. 
Illustrative Material: A Dollar Bill. 

Would you like to be a millionaire, to have a million 
dollars? Of course you would. I would, too. Well, 
what would you do with that much money? That's a 
question that is somewhat more difficult to answer, isn't 
it ? I want to know what you would spend it for or what 
you would do with it. "Buy an automobile." What kind ? 
"A Cadillac.' , "I would put it in a bank." "I would build 
a hospital." "Give a lot to Central Church." "Help the 
missionaries in China." "Found other Junior Churches." 
"Buy a new suit." "Take a ride in an aeroplane." "Go 
on a long trip on the train." 

Those are all very fine and pleasant things for which 
to spend money, but you couldn't spend it all that way, 
could you? You can't eat more than three meals a day, 
for if you do, you have indigestion. You can't wear 
more than one suit of clothes at a time, so you couldn't 
spend much more than a couple of thousand dollars on 
clothes. You can't ride in more than one automobile at 
a time, and perhaps three or four cars would be quite 
enough. You would still have nine-tenths of your money 
left. Your trip in the aeroplane would cost perhaps 
fifty dollars and your long railroad journey would not 

67 



68 THE JUNIOR CHURCH IN ACTION 

cost more than a thousand or two. What would you 
do with the rest ? 

I am asking this question because some day some of 
you boys and girls are going to be millionaires. Don't 
smile, for John D. Rockefeller at one time clerked in a 
small grocery store and Andrew Carnegie worked in the 
steel mills. You see, I want you to think of what you 
will do with your money before you earn it, whether you 
have a million dollars or a hundred thousand or only one 
thousand. If more men thought of what they would do 
with their money before they earned it, they would use 
it in a far better way once they got it. 

Now I will tell you what I would do with a million 
dollars. First of all, I would put one-twentieth of it in a 
bank to keep me when I grew old. Don't you think that 
would be a good plan ? All the rest I would use to help 
other folks very much in the ways some of you boys and 
girls have already suggested. That's what money is for — \ 
to use to help other people. God gave it to us to use 
helpfully, not to keep selfishly. 

I would be very careful where my money went, for I 
would want it to do the very greatest good. Before 
I gave my money to a mountain school of Tennessee, I 
would find out w T ho had charge of the school, how the 
money the school already had received was spent, how 
many boys and girls attended, and how many more could 
attend if my money was placed there. I would be sure 
that the pupils learned of God and Jesus, as well as of 
geography and arithmetic. Then I would give a certain 
sum of money in a way that would last the longest and 
do the most good. 

I think I would spend some, too, among the boys and 
girls of the downtown section of the city, there they have 



IF I HAD A MILLION DOLLARS 69 

only the alleys and the streets in which to play. I would 
start a club for them, and I would have that club open 
all day and each evening until nine o'clock — a club for 
boys near some good church and a club for girls near some 
other church. They would have games and books and 
magazines and manual training tools, and everything else 
that boys and girls like. I would get a fine Christian 
leader to take charge of each of them to help do the good 
work of making boys and girls better and happier. 

I would found a hospital in Korea and another in 
Singapore, big ones with a great many doctors and nurses., 
I would build a dozen churches in West China, each with 
a Sunday School and a day school. I would build and 
support a fine school and college for those bright Indian 
lads of India. I would send twenty-five missionaries into 
North Africa where the religion of Mahomet has made 
folks' lives so unhappy — especially the lives of the girls 
and the women. Oh, there are so many good causes which 
we would all like to help, that I am afraid that a million 
dollars would not go very far toward doing all that I 
would like to do. I would have to have a hundred mil- 
lion or a billion to do even a small part of the great work 
God wants done. 

Did you ever put Mentholatum on your finger, when 
you had a cut there? Well, it's made in a big factory 
either in Buffalo, New York, or in Wichita, Kansas, by a 
man named Mr. A. A. Hyde, who has thousands of men 
to help him. He makes hundreds of thousands of dollars 
each year, but he doesn't keep it all. He sets aside only a 
small sum for his own living expenses, and gives all the 
rest of his profits to help other people through the hos- 
pitals and schools he has built. I wish every successful 



7 o THE JUNIOR CHURCH IN ACTION 

business man would use the money; God lets him earn as 
well as Mr. Hyde does. 

We can all be millionaires — yes, every one of us. I 
am one myself. No, I haven't a million dollars in money, 
but I have a million dollar s' worth of happiness and health 
that God gave me, and I wouldn't sell it for all the money 
in the world. God meant all of us to be millionaires in 
happiness for others. This is the wealth that no man can 
steal from us. By being the kind of boys and girls God 
wants us to be, we are all millionaires all the time. 

Oh, Lord, whether we have a million dollars or a hun- 
dred dollars or only a few cents, may we use them for 
Thy work of helping other folks, for Jesus' sake. Amen. 



Ill 

KEEP TO THE RIGHT 

Text: "The Statutes of the Lord are Right, Rejoicing the Heart." 

Ps. XIX, 8. 
Illustrative Material: A Traffic Sign, "Keep to the Right," or a 

Cardboard Copy of One. 

A certain very wise man once said that there is music 
in running brooks and sermons in stones. If he were 
in Chicago or Detroit or New York, I am sure that he 
would add to-day, "And sermonets in traffic signs." 
Have you ever seen a sign that brought you more good 
advice than those red and white safety first ones that say, 
"Keep to the Right" ? They are not large, but they doubt- 
less save many lives every year, and prevent dozens of 
accidents. Through rain and sunshine, day and night, 
they stand on the street to warn autoists that they must 
not cut the corners too close, that they must not drive 
carelessly, and that they must always stay on their own 
side of the road. 

In England every one drives on the left side of the 
road. Do you know why ? Some one has given this rea- 
son. In the days before the railroads were built, the 
English people traveled in stage coaches. These large 
coaches were drawn by four or six horses, and were often 
driven by some rich man who did that just for the fun 
of it. The whip that he used would, of course, have to 
be very long to reach the leaders or the first team of 
horses, and in swinging that whip the driver would often 

7i 



72 THE JUNIOR CHURCH IN ACTION 

strike some one on the sidewalk instead of the lazy horses. 
In order to have most of the street in which to swing their 
long whips, the drivers began driving on the left. In 
France every one drives to the right, as we do here in 
America. 

Why do we keep to the right in driving? In order to 
avoid accidents, by knowing on which side of the street 
the other fellow is going to drive. We also drive to the 
right to make more speed, for if we had to dodge cars 
that w T ere coming up the w r rong side of the street, we 
would probably be late in getting down to the office or to 
the train. 

If I began driving my car down the left side of the 
street, what would happen? "You would have a wreck." 
"You would be arrested/' Yes, one of those two things 
would probably happen, perhaps both of them. The 
policeman would say, "Where did you learn to drive? Do 
you think you own the whole street? Come along with 
me to the police station." Of course I would go. And 
the Judge would say, "Mr. Crossland, for the sake of 
protecting other folks, I am not going to let you drive 
your automobile any more this year. You are fined 
twenty-five dollars for reckless driving." And after pay- 
ing my fine, I would have to ride the street cars or walk 
the rest of the year. If we always keep to the right, we 
will keep out of a great deal of trouble. 

I don't know of a better motto for us to take for our 
lives than just this one, "Keep to the Right." If you do 
not have a motto, or if you have one that you think isn't 
quite so good, you take this one. Say it over often, "Keep 
to the Right." When some of your friends, who are 
planning to do something that is not right, and are trying 
to get you to help, you say to yourself and to them, "Keep 



KEEP TO THE RIGHT 73 

to the Right.' ' They may laugh at you at the time, but 
they will like you better for it. When you do keep to 
the right, you are not only doing what other folks would 
have you do, but you are also doing what God would 
have you do. 

God has given us quite a number of traffic rules for 
our lives. You all know many of them — the Ten Com- 
mandments and the sayings of Jesus. They are really not 
hard to observe, if we just get into the habit of following 
them. Like driving an auto, they become very easy with 
a little practice, and we enjoy living according to them 
much more than we care for breaking them. 

How we all wish that every one "kept to the right" by 
living up to those traffic rules that God gave us for our 
lives. No one in all this world would be hungry or poor 
or cold or unhappy. There is money and food and cloth- 
ing and happiness enough to go round for everybody, if 
only some folks did not get and selfishly keep a great deal 
more than is their share. We Christians are glad when 
folks make money, for we ourselves enjoy having the 
things that money can buy. But we are sorry when we 
see folks keep all that money — so much more than they 
can use — for themselves. 

We will always "Keep to the Right" in the way we act 
toward other folks. We will obey God's traffic rules of 
life gladly and do everything we can to get others to obey 
them, too. Then we will free the whole world from 
sin and help to bring God's happiness to everybody every- 
where. 

Dear Lord, help us always to keep to the right, as Thou 
dost wish us. And by getting others to attend Church 
and Sunday School, may we teach them how to obey Thy 
laws, for Jesus' sake. Amen. 



IV 

A GOOD START 

Text: "Let Us Run with Patience the Race That Is Set before 
Us." Hebrews XII, i. 

How many of you have ever been in a race? Did you 
all win? You all had fun, anyway, didn't you? Have 
some of you been in a race where it was almost a tie? 
If you could have had just a little better start you might 
have won the jack knife or the medal. You have seen 
the runners get set on their mark and at the word "Go" 
they are off like the wind. 

A good start in any kind of a race gives us a head 
start, a few feet ahead of the other fellow. It should 
encourage us, though sometimes people slow up a little 
because they think they have a little time or distance to 
spare. 

All of you boys and girls are now in a race. It's a race 
that will last for about fifty or sixty years more, all 
through your life. You all have a good start, for God 
gave you healthy, strong bodies to use in that race. He 
also gave you only good habits that make it easier for you 
to do things for Him. And your parents sent you to 
school where you could learn how to read and write and 
learn of History and to Sunday School where you could 
learn how to live a good life. Why, in this race you are 
way ahead of millions of boys and girls who do not have 
a fair chance. 

74 



A GOOD START 75 

To win you must run as fast as you can, and then 
a little faster right at the end. Wouldn't you think a run- 
ner foolish, if he stopped to pick up a heavy stone when 
he was a third of the way toward the goal? And you 
would say he was almost crazy if he picked up a rope a 
little farther on and left 'it dangling about his feet. He 
would soon trip and fall, getting the cinders of the track 
in his hands, his elbows and his knees. You wouldn't 
pick him for a winner, would you ? 

So many boys and girls, who start out the race we 
are all running, stop and pick up a stone — or a bad habit 
— and then pick up another and another and another, until 
they begin to slow down. They lose speed, and drop be- 
hind those who lead. Do you know of any stones of this 
kind that boys and girls and men and women pick up? 
(The answers from the boys and girls were, "Drinking/ ' 
"Cigarettes," "Lying" and "Not coming to Sunday 
School!") Yes, those are some of them, and there are 
many others. 

You boys and girls do not drink, and you probably 
never will, for your fathers and mothers have voted the 
saloon out of the United States. You boys and girls will 
help them keep it out. And may you never pick up that 
very heavy stone, the cigarette. It makes your throat 
unhealthy, it harms and weakens your lungs, it makes 
your heart beat ever so much faster than it should to 
get rid of the poison, it makes you very nervous, and it 
destroys a part of your brain. One reason many smokers 
die when they become very ill with pneumonia or influ- 
enza is that they have so weakened their lungs and heart 
that they cannot do extra work, work overtime when they 
are 6ick. And the sad part about this stone, this habit, as 



76 THE JUNIOR CHURCH IN ACTION 

with all other bad ones, is that it is very, very hard to 
drop it. 

Lying is another habit that keeps us from running as 
good a race as we should. Cheating in school is another, 
for it is stealing from some one else and lying to the 
teacher, who thinks the answer is your own. Doing things 
in a careless, don't-care way; being quick-tempered or 
cross, quitting school before you graduate, thinking of evil 
things, listening to bad stories, not obeying your father or 
mother, and a dozen other things may easily rob us of 
the prize. 

How many of you want to be losers? Of course you 
don't. How many of you want to be winners ? Of course 
you do. And I'm going to tell you how to be. You must 
train. You must practice, just as the football or baseball 
players do. You must have a clean, strong body and must 
keep it clean. It is God's holy temple here on earth, worth 
much more to Him than this church building. He is ex- 
ceedingly sorry when he sees anyone take into it anything 
that harms it. He wants it always to be just as He made 
it, fine and strong for His Work. 

You must also have a clean strong mind. You can 
train your mind to do wonderful things, just as an acrobat 
in a circus trains his body to do wonderful things. A 
little training, say until the eighth grade in school, helps 
a little, but not enough. More training until the twelfth 
grade helps a great deal more. But to go on to some 
good college for four years more makes your mind ever 
so much stronger. 

You must have, too, a clean, strong conscience or soul, 
that will help you to do right and keep you from doing 
wrong. It is at home, and especially in the Sunday School 
and Junior Church that your conscience gets its training 



A GOOD START 77 

or practice. There we learn of God and of what He wants 
us to do. We learn how to treat other folks, how to do 
good deeds for them, how to make the world better and 
how to live right. In our home and in our school and 
in our church we learn how to be the best possible runners 
in this race. 

I'm glad that God helps us Christians in this race. 
When we get tired, He helps us along. He keeps us from 
picking up any stones or ropes during the race. If some 
folks do pick them up, God will help them get rid of them, 
if they will just ask Him. 

I want all you boys and girls to be WINNERS, as St. 
Paul was. I want you to have great success in your 
work for God. I want you to have the great prize of 
being with Him in Heaven that is to be the reward for 
all who run the race well. 

Prayer. Oh, Lord Jesus, we thank Thee for the good 
start we have had. May we run a good race for Thee, 
and get others to run that good race, too, for Jesus' sake. 
Amen. 



DO YOU OWN YOUR FACE? 

Text : "A Merry Heart Maketh a Cheerful Countenance." Proverbs 
XV, 13. 

Illustrative Material: A Mirror. 

Do you own your face? Think carefully before you 
answer. Do you? There are many things we call "our 
own" or "our very own," when we are real sure we own 
it. They may be the jack knife and marbles or the rabbits 
or the hair ribbons or rings or dolls. We can sell them 
if we wish or we say we can trade them to some of our 
boy or girl friends, if we can find any one who will trade. 
Sometimes we are glad over our trades, and sometimes 
we are not. 

But there are some things you have that you can't trade 
and really don't own. Your face is one of them. I see 
your brown or blue eyes, your straight or pug noses, your 
rosy cheeks, but you don't own them. Why? Because 
they belong to other people. They are the ones that have 
to look at your face, aren't they? Wouldn't it be grand 
if they might always look as happy and smiling and pleas- 
ant as they do now. 

Are they always that way ? Or do you sometimes look 
cross when your mother or father asks you to stop your 
play for a few minutes to do something for them ? Per- 
haps the corners of your mouth turn down, and your 
forehead wrinkles, your teeth set, a cloud comes over your 
face, and you look as if you had lost your last friend. 

78 



DO YOU OWN YOUR FACE? 79 

My, but you're a sight. You make every one about you 
unhappy by looking so much like a storm, and then, too, 
you make yourself more and more unhappy. 

I wish that we might always have a mirror in front 
of our faces, just like that. We would always be happy* 
and I'll tell you why. We would become awfully tired 
of looking at ourselves if we weren't looking pleasant. 
Just try this the next time you begin to get cross. Go 
right over and look in the mirror. Do you know what 
will happen? I do, for I've tried it. You'll first lose the 
frown, then begin to smile a little, then grin and then 
burst into a loud and happy laugh. You simply can't keep 
your face straight. And then the other person in the 
mirror will laugh back at you. You'll just trade your 
cross face for a jolly sunshiny one, and you'll wear a 
smile that will not come off for quite a while. 

Would you like to see a smile over twenty- four thou- 
sand miles long? One could be that long if every one 
would help. You begin smiling and the person next to 
you begins to smile, and then some one else sees both of 
you happy and he begins to smile, and then more and 
more other folks begin to smile, and at last the chain of 
happy smiles reaches around the world. Laugh, and the 
world laughs with you. 

That's what God wants — a twenty-four-thousand-mile 
smile. He wants every one in this whole world to be 
happy. He has placed so many delightful and beautiful 
things here and has given us so many good friends, that 
we would be truly ungrateful if we did not smile and be 
happy. 

Our faces show to others just the kind of folks that we 
are, and let them know quite a bit of what we are thinking. 
There was once a very famous detective, who could catch 



80 THE JUNIOR CHURCH IN ACTION 

robbers and law breakers when the other detectives failed. 
Some one asked him one time just how he was able to 
do such clever work. He said, "When I am told to find 
a man, I get his picture, and a mirror, and try to look 
as much like him as possible. Then I try to think of the 
things and the places of which he would think. It's 
easy, for you see I try to look like him. Then I go where 
I think he would go, and usually I catch him." 

By keeping our faces bright and happy we can do God's 
work here ever so much better. He wants us to be just 
the happiest possible, for He is glad, too, when we are. 
Let's always wear that bright, happy face, that shows 
others that we know God and that He loves us. 

Dear Lord, may we ever be boys and girls and men 
and women of the Happy Face, so that we can serve Thee 
better, for Jesus' sake. Amen. 



VI 

THE LAUGHTER OF JESUS 
Text: "Rejoice and Be Exceeding Glad." Matthew V, 12. 

Have you ever thought of Jesus as laughing or smil- 
ing? Nearly all the pictures of Him you have seen have 
shown Him as sad and pale and very sober. Many of 
the greatest painters thought of Him as a man of sorrows 
and acquainted with grief. Jesus had a great deal of sad- 
ness in His life, as when His friends forsook Him, when 
the people to whom He had come would not listen to Him, 
when the religious leaders of His nation tried to kill Him, 
and when at last He was betrayed by one of His dis- 
ciples. 

But at least one of the great painters, Hoffman, painted 
many pictures of Jesus as He was serving folks, and, of 
course, in those pictures Jesus' face is very happy. No 
one can be unhappy while doing kind deeds to other people. 

In the Beatitudes, where Jesus described the kind of 
people that belong to His Kingdom, he used the word 
"Blessed" of them. That means "happy" or "contented" 
or "fortunate." "Blessed are the meek and the peace- 
makers and the pure in heart." "Rejoice and be exceed- 
ing glad, for great is your reward in Heaven," Jesus said, 
and we know that He always practiced what He preached. 
Of all people on earth, Jesus wanted Christians to be most 
happy. 

Early in His ministry, Jesus attended a wedding at 

81 



82 THE JUNIOR CHURCH IN ACTION 

Cana in Galilee. In Jesus' day these were very happy 
affairs, and I know that Jesus was as truly happy there as 
any one. He loved to see people enjoying pure pleasures 
and wholesome fun. 

If you and I had lived in Jesus' time, I know we would 
have been among the great crowds that followed Him. 
Why, sometimes those crowds numbered six or seven 
thousand people. Do you think that if Jesus had been 
sad and gloomy that folks would have wished to listen 
to Him and would have followed Him out into the desert ? 
I don't, for it is a happy person that people love. Folks 
have quite enough sadness of their own without borrowing 
any more from any one else. They loved Jesus because 
He made their lives happier, because He helped them en- 
dure their sorrows, and because He lived the happy life 
that they wished so much to live. I am sure that He must 
have given a smile to each man or woman He healed, and 
that folks' hearts were made glad just by looking on 
Jesus' divine face. 

You boys and girls love Jesus more because He loved 
and loves boys and girls like you. They loved Him, too, 
while He was doing His work in Palestine. He always 
had time to pat a child on the head, and to talk with 
them. Do you remember reading about how displeased 
He was when His disciples told some of the mothers not 
to bring their children to Him? He said, "Of such is 
the Kingdom of Heaven." Jesus won the confidence of 
both mothers and children, not by a long face, but rather 
by His sweet smile. 

"Rejoice and be exceeding glad," or "Be just as glad 
and happy as you possibly can," are Jesus' words to each 
and every Christian. We should always be the happiest 
people in the world, for we have God for our Heavenly 



THE LAUGHTER OF JESUS 83 

Father, and Jesus Christ for our Older Brother. We are 
God's specially loved children, and over us He watches 
day and night. We are serving Him by serving other 
people, and great is our reward both here and in Heaven. 
[We have so many friends, so many joys and pleasures, 
so much of happiness, that I wonder how we can ever be 
unhappy. 

Let's always be happy — not necessarily laughing and 
cutting up all the time — but just happy, in order that we 
may be able to make other folks happier. And when 
folks ask, "What makes you so happy all the time?" just 
reply, "It is because I am a Christian, it is because Jesus 
is watching over me all the time." 

Dear Lord, we thank Thee for the laughter of Jesus, 
for His happy service for others. May we become more 
and more like Him, for Jesus' sake. Amen. 



VII 

HOW GREAT GOD IS 

Text : "When I Consider Thy Heavens, the Work of Thy Fingers, 
the Moon and Stars, Which Thou Hast Made, 

What is Man, that Thou Art Mindful of Him, or the Son of Man 
that Thou Visitest Him ?" Psalms VIII, 3, 4. 

Would you like to take a trip among the stars, a visit 
to one of the other worlds that we see hanging above us 
in the evening sky? I should like to take a trip to the 
moon, though the men who study the sky tell us that we 
would need the warmest overcoat we have if we went 
there. I should enjoy paying a visit to Mars, one of the 
stars that is nearest the earth — only 35,000,000 miles 
away — to see if any people live there, and to find out what 
those canal-like marks on Mars are, which we can see 
through the largest telescopes. The North Star is another 
I would like to visit, and the stars of the Great Dipper. 

You know the Milky Way is made up of thousands of 
stars, that we can see with just our eyes, and many more 
thousands we can see with a powerful telescope, and many, 
many thousands more that only the eye of the kodak can 
see. By taking pictures of one part of the sky, and then 
enlarging the picture we can make out a great many stars 
that we couldn't see in any other way. All of them are 
so far away that you and I can't even imagine how far 
they are. And I suppose that even beyond all those that 
we can see with our eyes and the telescope and the kodak 

84 



HOW GREAT GOD IS 85 

are millions and millions that we perhaps never can see, 
because they are so far away. 

God made all of those worlds, and keeps them moving 
in their courses. Isn't it all wonderful? He keeps our 
own earth moving around the sun. We can't know how 
He does it, but we know that it is He who planned this 
wonderful world in which we live. 

Some men have wondered how God could be interested 
in this world, when He has so many others. I think it 
is because we, His children, live here. We Christians 
know that "God so loved the world that He gave His only 
begotten Son, that whosoever believeth on Him should not 
perish, but have everlasting life." He must have loved 
this world a lot to have sent His only Son into it. 

Jesus came to show us what God was and is like, that 
He loves us one and all, that He wishes us to help Him 
in the work of building His Kingdom of Goodness and 
Purity and Happiness here. Before Jesus came, most 
folks thought that God was like a great king, who was 
sometimes rather cruel and strict. Jesus showed us that 
God is our Heavenly Father, who hates the sin but loves 
the sinner that repents, who forgives us when we are 
truly sorry, and who watches over us wherever we are. 

Though God is so great, He speaks to us through our 
consciences and through all the great prophets and saints, 
who have walked and talked with Him. Through our 
prayers we can ask Him about any matter that is impor- 
tant to us, and although He is ever so great and ever so 
busy, He is never too great or too busy to hear us and 
to answer. As we read His messages to Isaiah and Jere- 
miah and Paul and John, we learn how kind is His loving 
heart toward all His children. 

He sees all that we do, as He watches over us. Some- 



86 THE JUNIOR CHURCH IN ACTION 

times He is pleased with the kindnesses we do, and the 
thanks that we give Him, and He smiles and is glad At 
other times, He is sorry and displeased with those who 
are spiteful and sinful. His great heart longs to help 
everybody, if they will only ask Him to do so. 

Though God is so great, I am glad that He takes us 
Christians into partnership with Him, We are laborers 
together with God in His field, which is this world. W e 
can work with Him in the greatest job of the whole uni- 
verse — that of making this world better. We add our 
littleness to His greatness, and together, we can do won- 
derful things. 

Dear Lord, we are glad that Thou didst send Thy Son, 
Jesus Christ, to us to make us know that even in Thy 
greatness, Thou dost love us. Help us in the work we 
are trying to do for Thee, for Jesus' sake. Amen. ; 



VIII 

SOLDIERS OF THE KING 

Text: "Put on the Whole Armour of God." Ephesians VI, n. 
Illustrative Material: A Picture of Jesus and a Picture of Gen* 
eral Pershing. 

I like to see a real soldier, don't you? He is so trim 
and neat and straight that when we pass him, we, too, 
straighten up and put a little more spring into our walk. 
And when we see a hundred or five hundred of them 
marching together on Decoration Day, all in step, to the 
music of a military band, they are a fine sight. In the 
Great War they were Soldiers of Democracy and Right, 
and nobly did they fight to make the world safe for de- 
mocracy. They did not fight for more land or for more 
money, but they did fight with all their might for the right 
and for the weaker nation. They wanted all nations of 
the earth to have the same blessings of liberty and freedom 
that we ourselves have. They fought under a great 
leader, for a great cause, and we admire them for doing 
so. 

Every boy and every girl may be a soldier from this 
moment on. You may fight in a Greater War for a 
Greater Cause under a Greater Leader. You may all be 
Soldiers of the King. 

The King? Yes, King Jesus. Don't we sing, "On- 
ward, Christian Soldiers" and "Glory, praise and honor, 
unto Christ the King" ? Of course we do, and we mean 
it. In India the greatest missionary movement in the 

87 



88 THE JUNIOR CHURCH IN ACTION 

world is to-day going on. It is the Mass Movement, and 
it seeks to bring the sixty million outcaste Indians to Jesus 
Christ. The high caste Indian will not even touch one of 
these outcastes or help him in any way. These poor people 
are looked on as even less valuable than many of the ani- 
mals which you and I eat as food. 

Under the leadership of King Jesus, our missionaries 
are bringing them the happy gospel of Jesus, telling them 
that God loves them and cares for them, even if some of 
their fellow countrymen do not. They have a favorite 
song, which in the Indian sounds like an American Indian 
war song; but in English it simply means, "King Jesus is 
coming, King Jesus is coming." 

The truly great leader makes his soldiers like him. 
Jesus does this with all His followers. He makes us 
all so much finer and better than we otherwise could be. 
He goes with us wherever we go, and shares with us every 
danger. He even gave His life for us, and he urges us 
to give our lives for other people, to make them happier 
and nobler, as He made us. Since He died for us, we cer- 
tainly ought to be happy to live for Him. 

The Great War lasted only about four years, and then 
was over. The war against evil, in which all of us Chris- 
tians are engaged, lasts all our lives and must be fought 
all the time. It is the royal battle of good against evil, 
of right against wrong. Already Christians have won 
many battles against those who would enslave others, 
against those who would ruin others with strong drink, 
against those who would take from the poor and the 
weak all that they have. We Christians always try to be, 
just as Jesus was, the champions of all folks everywhere 
who need us, whether they are here in our own city or 
out in the middle of Africa. We must bring to them the 



SOLDIERS OF THE KING §9 

joys and cleanness of the Christian way of living, that 
they may become truly children of God. "Go ye into 
all the world and make disciples of all nations." 

The biggest battles that we have to fight are not out in 
India or out in Africa, but right here in our very own 
lives. Things creep into our lives that God does not 
want there. Some of those enemies which we must fight 
against in the great battle for King Jesus are lying and 
cheating and quarreling and disobedience to parents and 
laziness in school. He would have us be brave and manly 
and truthful both to Him and to our parents. 

In all the great battles in this world for Right, the 
Christians are always in the very front line trenches. 
They know what they are fighting for and they know also 
for whom they are fighting. Under the leadership of King 
Jesus, we Christians will overcome wrong and establish 
right in all the world, until the kingdoms of this world 
shall become the kingdoms of oui Lord and Saviour Jesus 
Christ. 

Dear Lord, may we as Thy soldiers be brave and true, 
always at our post of duty, ready to obey Thy commands 
gladly, for Jesus' sake, Amen. 



IX 

MEASURING FOLKS 

Text: "Till We All Come Unto the Measure of the Stature of 

the Fulness of Christ." Ephesians IV, 13. 
Illustrative Material: Three Girls, Three Boys, and a Yard 

Stick. 

I want you boys and girls to help me find out to-day 
what makes a person great. Each of you will of course 
be very much interested, for each of you wishes to become 
a well-known or a wealthy or a powerful man or woman. 
By learning what really makes men great, we can more 
easily become like them. 

Of these six Junior Church members, which is the 
tallest? Yes, that is quite easy to judge. Is Gerald 
greater than the other three because the yard stick says 
he is four inches taller than Marian? If he were two 
miles tall, he wouldn't be a greater person, unless he had 
something else to go along with his tallness. Which of 
them weighs the most? Earl? Yes, I would guess that 
too. And what do you weigh, Clem? "Sixty- four 
pounds." Is Earl greater just because he weighs sixteen 
pounds more than Clem? No, mere size doesn't count 
much when it comes to greatness. 

How much money does each of you have ? Seven cents, 
nothing, twelve cents and three cents, one cent, nothing. 
Is Eleanor a greater person because she has twelve cents 
and Donald has nothing? Yes, she is richer but perhaps 
not so great You remember what Jesus said about the 

go 



MEASURING FOLKS 91 

poor woman who put only two cents into the temple 
treasury? While the rich folks dropped a great deal of 
gold and silver into the large box where the money was 
placed, Jesus said of the poor widow, "She hath given 
more than all of them." Don't you think that a very poor 
man, who did something for other folks might be ever 
so much greater than a rich man who did nothing for 
anyone except himself? I do, for Jesus was never rich. 
He was probably poorer than any of you will ever be, but 
He was the greatest person the people of this world have 
ever seen. Does only money make one great? Of course 
not. 

Let us just suppose for a moment that Elsie becomes 
President of the United States, for perhaps we will have 
a lady president some day, and that Landon becomes an 
inventor even more wonderful than Mr, Edison. The 
one would occupy the highest position in the United 
States, but the other might be, as Mr. Edison is, greater 
than many of the Presidents we have had. No, the posi- 
tion one has isn't the real way to tell whether a person 
is great or not. 

What is it then, that makes a person great? Or how 
would you set about it to become great? I want your 
answers. Name some of the great men whom you like 
and admire. "Lincoln," Why? "Because he freed the 
slaves." Another. "Washington." Why? "Because he 
fought for America to protect her." Another. "Liv- 
ingstone." Why? "Because he was a missionary to the 
Africans." Another. "Edison." Why? "Because he 
has invented so many things like the phonograph that 
make our lives nicer." 

Now why do you say these men are great? Because 
they do so much for other folks and because they tried 



92 THE JUNIOR CHURCH IN ACTION 

to help them all they could. That is just the reason we 
love and admire Jesus so much, who was greater than 
them all. He gave His whole life to other folks. He lived 
just for them. He preached the good news of God to 
them. He taught them how they should act toward one 
another. He healed those who were lame. He cured 
those that were sick. He made those hear who were deaf 
and those speak who were dumb. He even died on the 
cross for the whole world. We love Jesus and know He 
is God's Son, because He did for folks just what God 
would have done if He had come down to earth. Jesus 
showed us how good and how loving God is, and as 
Christians we try to become like Him. 

When you boys and girls set out to become great, don't 
try just to get a lot of money or to hold a high position, 
but just work to make folks better and happier and more 
like Jesus. If you have money, use it for other folks. 
It's more fun to spend it for their comfort and happiness 
than it is to keep it. If you have a high position, use it 
for other folks, as Jesus did His. Then you will be truly 
happy, and God will say, "Well done, thou good and 
faithful servant, enter thou into the joy of thy Lord." 

Dear Lord, we pray that we may sometime become 
great men and women for Thee and Thy Work, for Jesus' 
sake. Amen. 



X 

WHAT SHALL I BE? 
Text: "Lord, What Wilt Thou Have Me to Do?" Acts IX, 6, 

You boys and girls like to do the same things that 
grown-ups do. Well, I am going to ask you a very im- 
portant question, and if you can't answer it, then I want 
you to think about it. "What are you going to be when 
you grow up?" If you have a plan, I would like to have 
you tell me for I want to tell you how you can be success- 
ful in what you are going to do. (The answers were as 
follows: A doctor, a nurse, a private secretary, an 
airman, an engineer, a deaconess, a merchant, a preacher, 
a lawyer, a missionary, a school teacher and a Sunday 
School teacher.) Those are some very good answers, 
and although you may sometime change your mind and 
decide to be something else, I am glad that you are think- 
ing about it. 

But there's a more important question than the one 
you have just answered. It is "What kind of a lawyer 
or doctor or preacher or school teacher shall I be?" and 
your answer I know is, "The best one I can possibly be." 
There are many poor doctors or lawyers or preachers or 
school teachers, who do not do their work at all well. I 
sometimes wonder if they are doing just the work that 
God wanted them to do. 

But each of us wishes to be the very best worker pos- 
sible. You who will be doctors will wish to make folks 

93 



94 THE JUNIOR CHURCH IN ACTION 

well, and to perform wonderful operations, perhaps to 
have charge of a large hospital, to make lame folks walk 
and blind folks see and deaf folks hear and dumb folks 
speak, and to save folks* lives as Jesus did. Those are 
fine things to do, worthy of any man, and the nurse who 
watches over the patient is almost as important in making 
folks well as is the doctor. 

You boys and girls that expect to be merchants want to 
have a fine business, to make money, but to make it hon- 
estly, to give the folks who trade with you their money's 
worth, and to pay those clerks who work for you a salary 
large enough for them to live on and still save something 
for the day when they will become old. 

You boys who will become preachers or missionaries 
or you girls who will become deaconesses or missionaries 
will have what I think is the greatest and the hardest and 
the finest job in the world. You will tell folks of God and 
His son, Jesus, you will tell them of how He wants them 
to live, you will cheer them when they become discouraged, 
you will make plans for helping folks who have had mis- 
fortune, you will make bad folks good and good folks 
better, you will have the fun of working among boys and 
girls and of teaching them of God. You may never be 
rich, but you will have much treasure laid up in Heaven. 

You who will be school teachers will be doing a fine and 
noble work. You will teach boys and girls those things 
that will help them be successful in business. Your work 
will sometimes be hard, but your pupils will love you for 
what you do for them. The private secretary will have 
charge of very important matters. The airman will fly 
among the birds of God's heaven, and will carry our letters 
to distant places very quickly. The engineer will pilot his 
train with the hundreds of people on board safely to the 



WHAT SHALL I BE? 95 

place where they wish to go. The lawyer will keep the 
strong and rich from doing wrong to the poorer man 
by defending him in court. The Sunday School teacher 
will have the joy of helping make her pupils good and 
useful boys and girls. 

Whatever we decide to become, we will ask God what 
He wants us to do. We sing, "I'll go where you want me 
to go, I'll be what you want me to be." We must always 
ask God if the work we are thinking of is the work He 
wants us to do. Some of you boys that are thinking of 
being lawyers will be preachers. That was what happened 
to me. I asked God where He wanted me, and where I 
could do the most good for other folks, and He told me, 
"In the ministry." You boys and girls ask Him in prayer, 
and then do gladly and happily just the thing He wishes. 
Oh, no He will not want all of you to be preachers or 
deaconesses or engineers or lawyers or doctors. Some 
of you would be a poor preacher but a good doctor. Some 
of you would be a good missionary but a poor merchant. 
God has a plan for you. You ask Him what it is, will 
you? 

Whatever you may become, God wants you always to 
be a Christian. Yes, a Christian street sweeper, or a 
Christian merchant, or a Christian school teacher or a 
Christian airman. If you become rich, spend that money 
for other folks. The happy man, the true Christian is 
one who is always working for God by working for 
other folks. That's what Jesus did. That's what He 
wants us to do. And we will do it. 

Dear Lord, whether we become lawyers or doctors or 
preachers or nurses or engineers, may we be good ones, 
Christian ones that work for Thee and for others, for 
Jesus sake. Amen. 



XI 

ARE YOU IN TUNE? 

Text: "Be Ye Therefore Perfect, Even as Your Father Which Is 

in Heaven Is Perfect." Matt. V, 48. 
Illustrative Material: A Junior Church Member with a Violin 

or Mandolin, to Be Played First in Tune and then Out of 

Tune. 

I am glad that our Christian religion is a singing reli- 
gion. How could we help praising God in song, when 
He has made us so happy. You remember that even when 
Paul was thrown into prison, he sang songs and psalms 
of praise because God had used him to carry the good 
news of Jesus to so many cities in the Roman Empire. 
As the early Christian martyrs were driven into the arena 
to the lions, they sang songs of that other world, Heaven, 
where they knew they would be much happier than they 
could ever be here. Christians to-day in hundreds of 
thousands of churches all around the world are raising 
their voices in song to Him who has done so much for 
them. 

Members of other religions, seeing how happy Chris- 
tians are, have used our great hymns such as 

"O, for a thousand tongues to sing 
My Great Redeemer's praise." 

The believers in Buddha just change each line of the song 
in which Christ's name appears so that they may sing 

"O for a thousand tongues to sing 
My holy Buddha's praise." 
96 



ARE YOU IN TUNE? 97 

Their priests are trying to bring some of the Christian 
happiness into that sad religion, that will some day give 
way before the happy religion of our Lord and Saviour, 
Jesus Christ, 

Everybody who loves good things loves good music. 
If the piano is out of tune, or if the violin is not in tune, 
then we don't have music ; we just have noise. Each piece 
in an orchestra must be in tune with itself and with all 
the other pieces if we are to have the best music. I want 
Helen to let down the "D" string and then make the "E" 
string a little tighter, and try to play ''America." You 
couldn't sing America's national song to a tune like that, 
could you ? Some of us have a hard enough time carrying 
the tune, even when all the instruments are in tune. 

Some folks are just like a violin that is out of tune. 
They are out of tune with themselves, and they are out 
of tune with other people, and they are even out of 
tune with God. They make the noise of unhappiness in 
the world instead of the sweet music of happiness. The 
reason is that they are out of tune with God. Some of 
them think that they can, without Him, fill the world with 
beautiful music, but they cannot. 

When they do not listen to Him, they soon get out of 
tune with His rules and laws. They do not use their 
bodies as He would have them used. God intended that 
their minds should be used to think out the great prob- 
lems of people's lives, to help others out of the difficulties 
and hard places in which they are. Indeed, so many of 
them use their thinking powers only to get more money 
and position for themselves. He planned that the hands 
should serve the sick and the needy, that their feet should 
go on His errands of mercy and love, and that their lips 
should speak words of comfort and hope to all people 



98 THE JUNIOR CHURCH IN ACTION 

everywhere, who need them. Oh, how out of tune with 
God so many of His children are ! Because they are out 
of tune with Him they are not happy in their own lives, 
nor are they in tune with others. 

If they could only see how truly happy they might be 
if they were in tune with Him, I know that most of them 
would make an honest effort to put themselves in har- 
mony with Him. He says, "Come unto me, all ye that 
are weary and heavy-ladened, and I will give you rest." 
,You and I as Christians are so much more contented and 
useful when we are obeying His laws and doing His will. 

Moses put himself in God's hands and became the 
George Washington of the Jewish nation. Amos, the 
shepherd, put himself in tune with God, and brought a 
great message to his nation and to the whole world. Paul 
placed himself under God's orders and became the great- 
est missionary this world has yet seen. [Wesley talked 
with God until He was in tune with Him, and to-day a 
great church that reaches around the world is the result. 

If we always keep in tune with God, He will make us 
great and useful men and women, who with Him will 
make the world a happier and better place. 

Dear Lord, keep us close to Thee, that we may always 
be in tune with Thee in Thy great work, for Jesus' sake. 
Amen. 



XII 

BE STRONG 

Text: "Be Strong." 2 Timothy, II, 1. 
Illustrative Material: A Picture of Washington. 

If I could say only two words to you boys and girls 
to-day, I would say what St. Paul said to his young 
friend, Timothy, "Be Strong." I would of course mean 
that I would wish you to be strong not only in your 
bodies but also in your minds and in your consciences. 

Everybody likes to be strong in body, to have good 
health, and a good complexion. You boys like to be 
strong so that you can win in the contests of running, 
tennis, football and baseball. God gave you a fairly 
good supply of strength, and in His plan He laid down 
the rule that the more you use your strength, the more 
He gives you. One very general reason for so many folks 
being weak in body is that they don't exercise, they don't 
use their muscles enough. 

Did Paul want Timothy to be strong in body only? 
I am sure that he did not, for some strong men have used 
their strength for a very bad purpose. It would have 
been better for themselves and for others if they had 
been weak. Samson would have been ever so much more 
famous and noble had he used his strength always to 
fight God's battles for His people. To be strong only in 
body, as Samson was, is to be lopsided. But to have 

99 



loo THE JUNIOR CHURCH IN ACTION 

Jiealth and strength, the better to do God's work is one 
of the finest of things. 

Paul wanted Timothy to be strong in mind also, just 
as God wants each one of us to be. Would you like to 
be able to get your lessons more easily, to draw maps, 
to spell and to do your arithmetic in a shorter time? 
Haven't you often wished that you were as clever as 
Robert or Bernice or Marjorie ? They seem to learn with- 
out trying, while sometimes you have so much trouble 
with your lessons. Would you like to be as bright as 
they are? I'll tell you how you can do it. 

God gave you a very good mind with which to think. 
He had as a part of His plan that the more you use it the 
brighter it becomes. The more you study, the stronger 
your mind grows. Of course to have a strong mind and 
not to have a strong conscience to go with it is very 
dangerous. Some of the cleverest thieves of the country 
have been men who had wonderful minds. The leaders 
of Germany, who helped bring on the war that destroyed 
so many million lives and homes, were bright, but they 
did not love God at all. You know a little of how terrible 
was the sorrow their cleverness brought. No, I am sure 
that Paul did not want Timothy to be strong only in mind. 
» Even more important than being strong in body and 
mind is being strong in spirit or conscience. Of course 
God wants us to be strong in all three ways, and I am 
glad that it is possible for us to be, aren't you? Our 
consciences must be strong and must be kept in touch with 
God in order that we may always be able to tell the differ- 
ence between a deed that is right and one that is wrong. 
Our hearts must be strong but tender that we may be 
generous and helpful toward every one. Does that mean 
toward everybody in the whole world? Yes it does, for 



BE STRONG 101 

since we are all children of our Heavenly Father, we 
are all brothers and sisters together. 

We must be strong to fight the many battles against 
evil, both those in our lives to-day and those we will have 
when we grow older. We must be strong to fight the 
battles for the right, that we may do God's will through 
all our lives. I like to see a boy stand up for a weaker 
fellow, don't you? Most of us Americans are like that. 
I like too, to see a boy tell the truth, even if he does 
deserve and receive a spanking for what he did. It makes 
a bigger, stronger, finer boy out of him, and that's what 
we want, isn't it ? 

I have always admired Washington, because he was so 
strong in all the three ways I have mentioned. He was 
strong in body, for he endured with all his soldiers the 
terrible winter at Valley Forge. He was strong in mind, 
for as President of the United States he said and did some 
very noble and brilliant things. And he was strong in 
spirit and conscience, for he so often prayed to God for 
help and guidance in the difficult tasks he had to do for 
his country. 

To be strong in body and mind and spirit should be 
the aim of every Christian. 

Dear Lord, make us strong in all our lives, that we 
may be able to do Thy work ever so much better, for 
Jesus' sake. Amen, 



XIII 

A BOOK OF RULES 

Text: "Thy Word is a Lamp Unto My Feet and a Light Unto My 

Path." Psalms CXIX, 105. 
Illustrative Material: A Spaulding Book of Football Rules and 

a Bible. 

Whenever you play a game you of course have cer- 
tain rules. If it is a game of marbles, each fellow takes 
his turn. If it is baseball, tag, or drop-the-handkerchief or 
blindman's buff you have ways you play each of these 
games. Anyone who doesn't play according to the rules, 
doesn't play long. I have here Spaulding's Book of Rules 
for Football. It is the best book of its kind, it is official, 
as we say. All the football games of America are played 
according to its rules. "No player may be off side," is 
one of those rules. There are many others that make 
the game more interesting and less dangerous. 

I am going to tell you of the greatest game on earth 
and of the Book of Rules that go with that game. Fun? 
I should say so! It's the game of Living at Your Best, 
and the Book of Rules is the Bible. Just as Spaulding 
prints a book on "How To Play Football," just so God 
has given us a Book on "How To Live." 

There are many good books in the world, but the best 
of all is the Bible. It has in it God's best messages and 
they are for the people of all nations. You know it was 
not all written by one man, for Moses wrote some parts 
of it, Isaiah other parts, and Matthew, Mark, Luke and 
John still other parts. But all the parts have special mes* 
sages or rules that help folks. 

102 



A BOOK OF RULES 103 

What are some of those rules? "The Ten Command- 
ments." Just after Moses led the children of Israel out 
of Egypt, God gave him these ten rules about how each 
Israelite should act toward God and toward men. Let's 
all repeat them. "Thou shalt not kill," "Thou shalt not 
steal," "Thou shalt not bear false witness," and the seven 
others are the beginning of most of our good laws to-day. 
They are good, but they tell us only what not to do in this 
game of life. 

When Jesus came he said, "All those rules are good. 
You must keep them, but a new commandment I give 
unto you; you shall love the Lord thy God with all thy 
heart, and with all thy mind and with all thy soul and thy 
neighbor as thyself." I am glad that Jesus told us what 
to do, as well as what not to do, aren't you? If all men 
loved their neighbor as themselves, there would be no 
stealing, for they would not want their neighbor to steal 
from them. There would be no lying or killing or wish- 
ing for something that belongs to someone else, for folks 
would not want their neighbor to do those things to them. 
You and I, boys and girls, could do away with all the evil 
in the world, if we could get all other people to live as 
Jesus lives, — to follow the book of rules. Then we would 
need no jails or state prisons or wars for all people every- 
where would do good to others instead of harming them. 

We must read that Book of Rules, the Bible, often 
to see if we are playing the game as we should, and to 
learn more about the game. How often? At least once 
a day, in the morning, or tw T ice a day, in the morning or 
the evening, if possible. We do not need to read several 
chapters to get God's message to our lives. I start here 
with the ninth chapter of Matthew and read, "And he 
entered into a ship and passed over, and came into his own 



io 4 THE JUNIOR CHURCH IN ACTION 

city. And behold they brought to him a man sick of the 
palsy, lying on a bed; and Jesus, seeing their faith, said 
to the sick of the palsy;" 

And then I come to a verse that means something 
specially to me, "Son, be of good cheer;" 

That is the lesson God has for me to-day, and as I go 
about my work I think about it, and practice it. If I 
learn of how he spoke to the men who wrote the books 
of the Bible, and if I listen to Him He will also speak 
to me very clearly. 

I wish I had money enough to buy a Bible for every 
boy and girl in the world, — a small one bound in leather 
that they could carry with them and read often. Of 
course I would give it to them only if they would promise 
to read at least two verses in it every day, for if they 
would not use it, I would want to use the money for 
something else. Since I can't do that, don't you boys and 
girls think you could each buy one ? I do. One you could 
have all for your own, and that you could read regularly 
in the morning and then sometimes during the day too. 
On next Sunday I want every boy and girl to bring his 
or her Bible with him. I want you to carry it all week, 
if it is not too large, and I want you to read it every day. 
Will you do it? And on next Sunday morning I want 
you to give at least one Bible verse that you have learned. 

By following God's Book of Rules, we become great 
and good men and women as were Washington, General 
Booth and General Foch, and Frances Willard, the kind 
of men and women God wants us to be. 

Dear Lord, we promise thee that we will often read 
Thy Great Book of Rules and that we will follow them 
better than we have for Jesus' sake. Amen. 



XIV 

LISTENING TO VOICES 

Text: "Speak, Lord, for Thy Servant Heareth." i Samuel III, 

10. 
Illustrative Material: A Picture of Joan of Arc. 

I think that this world has had almost as many great 
women as great men, don't you? The only difference 
is that we have heard so much more about the famous 
men than we have about famous women. That's natural, 
because the men do more striking things, like winning 
wars. Then, too, most of the histories have been written 
by men. But there are many more great women and men 
than were ever written about in all the histories. They 
are those men and women, like your father and mother, 
who in their own homes and their own towns lived and 
served and loved. Of one of those, a poor French peasant 
girl, I want to tell you. 

The French nation is a very old one, and has had some 
wonderful and talented women. Of all of them Joan of 
Arc is without doubt the most famous. Why? We shall 
see. Joan's girlhood was spent out in the province of 
Champagne, where many of the battles of the Great War 
have been fought. Her parents were very poor, as have 
been the parents of so many of the world's great men. 
Can you name any whose parents were not wealthy? 
"Lincoln." "Napoleon." Yes, and a great many others. 

Much of Joan's time was spent in tending her father's 
sheep, and in doing other tasks about her country home. 

105 



io6 THE JUNIOR CHURCH IN ACTION 

Like David, she had a great deal of time to think about 
God and her own life, and her duty to other folks. She 
could hear God speak a great deal more clearly than most 
of us hear Him amid the noise and bustle of the city. 

As Joan thought of what she might become, and longed 
to do something great for her people, she heard voices 
speaking to her of the service she would sometime do in 
freeing France from a grasping king who claimed a part 
of fair France as his own. I don't think myself that 
those voices were so loud that you or I could have heard 
them if we had been there. But I do think that Joan's 
conscience spoke so clearly to her about her duty to France 
that she could almost hear the voices speaking. I am 
sure that Joan was a girl who had many day dreams, that 
is, thoughts and plans of what she might do and be when 
she became older. 

I wish that all of us might have more day dreams of 
greatness and service. We too, then, might hear God's 
voice speaking to us, telling us what His plan is for our 
lives. The reason we often cannot hear His voice is that 
we don't listen. How much greater some men might 
have been if they had only listened to Him. How much 
more good each one of us might do, if we only listened 
at all times to Him. He is calling some boys here to be 
ministers for Him. He is calling some girls here to be 
deaconesses or special Christian workers in His Church. 
Ask God where He wants you to work, and He will tell 
you. 

I admire Joan, not only because she heard the call of 
conscience and duty, but because she obeyed that call. She 
went to the military leaders and told them that she would 
defeat the enemies of France. They laughed at her, just 
as the saloon men laughed at our mothers when they 



LISTENING TO VOICES 107 

taught us the words, 'Tremble, King Alcohol, we shall 
grow up." God told the Christian leaders that it could 
be done, and anything that should be done for God and 
His work here we must do. In spite of the jeers and 
ridicule of many of her own people, she kept right on 
until she persuaded one commander to let her lead a com- 
pany of soldiers to prove her mission. With just a few 
men she defeated the enemy in a brilliant battle, and when 
more soldiers were given her, she again and again won 
battles for her country. 

She was at last captured and sold to her enemies, who 
basely accused her of being a witch. She received no 
justice, as all the witnesses against her told lies. She was 
of course convicted and then was burned at the stake. 

To-day France loves and admires her more than any 
other French woman. She was great because she believed 
and trusted in God, because she unselfishly worked and 
fought for others, and because she was willing even to die 
for what she thought was right. 

Let us too, listen to God's voice, that we may do some- 
thing worth while for Him and His Work while we are 
living on this earth. 

Dear Lord, may we ever be listening to Thy voice, 
and be ready to do Thy bidding, as Joan of Arc was, for 
Jesus' sake. Amen. 



XV 
BUILDING AIR-CASTLES 

Text: "I Will Lift Up Mine Eyes unto the Hills, from Whence 
Cometh My Help." Psalms CXXI, I. 

Do you like to dream? Sometimes you do and some- 
times you don't. Those dreams of parties and of fishing 
and of baseball are lots of fun, and sometimes you try to 
go back to sleep again to finish your pleasant dream. But 
those others of Indians and burglars and fights waken 
you with a start, and you have very hard work to go back 
to sleep again. 

I've a dream game that all of you will enjoy playing. 
All the great men that have ever lived have played it. 
It's the game of building air-castles, — building real air- 
castles. You can play it either in the day time or in the 
night, without ever getting tired of it. 

What is an air-castle ? It is a great plan that you have 
in your mind, which you would like to work out. It's 
something that you want to do, — something that you have 
to work for. There are many kinds of air-castles, some 
^that are good and others that are not. You of course 
want to build only the kind that are best. 

Any air-castle that you build must have a good founda- 
tion so that it will not fall over just as soon as you have 
it finished. It must be well planned from the basement 
to the roof. It must be strongly put together, and it must 
be good for something. Would you believe that this great 

108 



BUILDING AIR-CASTLES 10$ 

church, which does so much good for God and His King- 
dom, was once just an air-castle ? It was, for just a few 
men of the Official Board came together and said, "We 
must have a larger building in which to do God's work, 
Let us plan one," and that was the beginning of the air- 
castle. 

Then they secured an architect, who could work out the 
plans carefully. He drew a picture of the church as it 
would look when it was finished, and made a drawing of 
each floor and of each room in the whole building. The 
Official Board then looked over these blue prints, made 
some changes, and then gave the plans to several men 
who build large churches. The one who promised to do 
it the cheapest and the best was chosen to do the building. 
With many men to help him, he digged the basement, laid 
the foundation, put up the steel frame work, built in the 
walls, one brick at a time, put on the roof, made the rooms 
beautiful with many decorations, and then turned the* 
finished building over to the people of the church to use. 
So an air-castle, one that would help folks do God's work 
for hundreds of years to come, was made a real castle, a 
temple in which we worship God and hear His will 
for us. 

Perhaps most of us have already begun to build air- 
castles. They look very beautiful and good to us, and I 
hope they all are. Are they the kind that God wants us 
to build? Have we asked Him about them and are they 
being planned for His use or for our own? So many 
folks forget, when they begin to plan and build, that God 
gives them all the material, and that whatever they build 
belongs to Him. He gives them the air they breathe 
while they are planning, He gives them the strength to 
build, He gives them the sand and stone and wood from 



no THE JUNIOR CHURCH IN ACTION 

His great hill-sides and forests. Whatever they build 
really belongs to Him, and He merely lets them have the 
use of these things for a time. 

He is glad when they build many of the rooms in their 
air-castles for other folks, instead of planning them all 
for themselves. If it is an air-castle of riches or of office 
or of wisdom that you are planning to build, remember 
that God always wants you to think of other people when 
you are building. The true Christian makes every one 
in the whole world his friend, and does all that he can 
for all his friends. He gives some of his money to build 
a hospital for the Chinese; some of his time to make the 
city where he lives better and happier; and some of his 
time asking God in prayer to help him build something 
that will be worth while. It's to folks who build like that 
that God says, "Well done, thou good and faithful ser- 
vant, enter thou into the joy of thy Lord." 

Dear Lord, in all our plans and our building, may we 
plan and build as Thou wouldst have us, for Thee and 
for others, for Jesus' sake. Amen. 



XVI 
BE A GOOD SCOUT 

Text: "Be Ye Ready." Matt. XXIV, 44. 

Illustrative Material: A Boy Scout in Uniform, or a Scout 
Badge with the Words, "Be Prepared," on It. 

I suppose that nearly every boy would like to be a Boy 
Scout. The uniform is about as good looking as any 
suit a boy could wish to wear. The hikes across the prai- 
rie and through the woods are lots of fun. The camping, 
swimming, tracking and outdoor sports appeal to every 
red-blooded boy. And the Scout meetings, the tests that 
a Scout must pass in knot tying, fire-building and cook- 
ing teach a boy much in helping him take care of himself. 
To become a first-class Scout and perhaps a Scout Master 
are honors well worth looking for. 

I want Scout Wallace to give the Scout Oath. "On my 
honor I will do my best : to do my duty to God and my 
country, and to obey the scout law; to help other people 
at all times; to keep myself physically strong, mentally 
awake and morally straight." That's a promise that any 
boy or girl could take, isn't it ? God wants us to do our 
duty always to Him and to our country, and He wants 
us to be strong, and as wise and as good as it is possible 
for us to be. Only by doing so can we be able workers 
for Him. 

Scout Hill will repeat the Scout Motto. "Be Prepared." 
While of course there were no Scouts in Jesus' time, it is 
interesting to see that the boy who helped more people 

in 



ii2 THE JUNIOR CHURCH IN ACTION 

than any other lad in the New Testament was a boy who 
was prepared. Do you know who he was ? He was the 
boy who had in his lunch basket the five barley loaves 
the two small fishes. The other five thousand folks, who 
had followed Jesus came without bringing anything to eat 
with them. They had followed Jesus for miles, asking 
Him questions and listening to His wonderful teaching. 
When they became hungry, Jesus with God's blessing, 
took the loaves and the fishes, which the boy loaned, and 
fed the whole multitude. Can one small boy be of so 
much use in the world to-day? He can if he is prepared. 
And he can best become prepared by study in school and 
Sunday School and Church. 

Scout Wright will give the Scout Law: "A Scout is 
trustworthy, loyal, helpful, friendly, courteous, kind, obe- 
dient, cheerful, thrifty, brave, clean and reverent." 
Through all Jesus' life He was all these things all the 
time, and as His followers it is our duty to be as nearly 
like Him as possible. 

It is the aim of every Scout to be a good Scout. To be 
so he must live up to his scout promise and ideals, both 
when he is in uniform and when he is not. He will be 
especially careful to avoid everything that might bring 
disgrace on him, his uniform and the Scout organization. 
He will carefully remember to do a good turn daily, and 
if he is a real good Scout he will do as many good turns 
every day as it is possible for him to do. He will be a 
loyal Scout and a loyal Christian. I know one reason 
why the Scouts are as good as they are: a great many 
over half, — nearly three quarters of the Scout Troops are 
composed of church boys and are held in churches. How 
could they help being good ! 

Have you ever had some one who was trying to get 



BE A GOOD SCOUT 113 

( you to do something that was not right, say, "Come on, 
be a good scout and do this." Perhaps it was to lie or to 
steal or to do some other fellow a dirty turn. What that 
other person should have said was, "Come on, and be a 
bad scout and do this/' for no good Scout or Christian 
will wrong others. 

The truly good scout always keeps all God's laws, and 
helps other people at all times. 

Dear Lord, may we always be good scouts for Thee, 
for Jesus' sake. Amen. 



XVII 

TALKING WITH GOD 

Text: "God Doth Talk with Man." Deut. V, 24. 

Do you like to talk with great men and great women? 
I do, whenever I get the chance. With what famous 
person would you like to talk, if you had your choice? 
"General Pershing." "General Foch," 'The President." 
What would you say to them? You might ask General 
Pershing about how the American soldiers fought. You 
might ask Marshal Foch, who had command of all the 
armies on the western front, about who won the war. 
He would probably say, "God and a few brave soldiers." 
When you meet some great person, you of course talk 
just a little. You ask some questions, but you let that 
great person do most of the talking, don't you? 

Isn't it natural and easy to talk with your father or 
mother? Did you ever think of how many times a day 
you ask them for things? You talk with them at least 
twenty-five times a day. You ask them for a nickel or a 
dime, for something to eat. Of course you always say 
"Please," first. You ask your mother where your hair 
ribbon is, or your sling shot, and isn't it wonderful that 
your mother almost always knows just where those things 
are? I used to wonder how my mother could remember 
so many things. I hope that you always say, "Thank you, 
mother," or "Thank you, dad." Do you? And some- 
times do you just sit down with them and talk with them 

114 



TALKING WITH GOD 115 

and tell them that you love them for all the good things 
they have done for you? If you have not told them that 
lately, just whisper it in their ears to-day, and see how 
happy you make them. 

Every day I talk with some one that is ever so much 
more wonderful than the President or General Pershing 
or Marshal Foch. Each morning and each evening, and 
sometimes during the day I talk with God about the things 
that I am doing. Each morning I ask Him that I may 
do His will and His work during the whole day, that He 
will help me and that I may do something for other folks 
that will really help them. I also thank Him for the 
refreshing rest that I have had during the night. Often 
during the day, when I am doing something that is very 
difficult, I ask Him to help me, and He does. And at 
night, when the work of the day is over, and I am tired, 
I thank Him for keeping me safely through the day, for 
the chances of helping other folks, for the friends I have 
made, and for all the joy and happiness that He has 
brought to my life during the day. 

There are so many things for which folks should thank 
God that the wonder is that they don't talk with Him of- 
tener than they do. He gives us good health, the fresh 
air to breathe, the warm sunshine to waken the grass and 
the flowers in the Spring-time, the gentle rains to keep 
them from becoming thirsty, the food to keep us from 
starving, the materials out of which our homes are made, 
—oh, God gives us everything that we have or can hope 
to have. We must thank God often for all these won- 
derful things that make our lives so happy. 

We must also ask Him to help us whenever we need 
Him. Folks ask Him for so many things that they don't 
need, and for so many things that would harm them if 



n6 THE JUNIOR CHURCH IN ACTION 

they did have them. God gives us always that which is 
best for us. Jesus taught us to pray, "Thy will be done,' , 
meaning that if what we ask is best for us, we wish that 
God would do it for us : if it is not, then we do not want 
God to do it for us. We want His will for us rather than 
our own. 

He is always listening to catch the prayer of the oldest 
person or that of the youngest child. He never goes away 
on a journey, as some heathen people think their gods 
do. God is everywhere, and is listening to us and watch- 
ing over us wherever we may be, whether on land or on 
sea, at the North Pole or in the hottest part of Africa. 

How shall we talk with Him ? With our heads bowed 
and our eyes closed. We should think of nothing but of 
Him, and should not let anything disturb us. We should 
pray, believing that God will give us what is best for us. 

An American soldier back behind the lines in France 
once wandered into an old church that had been shattered 
by many shells. The roof was gone and the beautiful 
stained glass windows were all broken. As the soldier 
wandered about the church, looking at everything as we 
Americans do, he noticed a French officer in one of the 
few remaining pews in prayer. The Frenchman did not 
rise for more than ten minutes, and when he did, departed 
very quietly. The American noticed that the officer was 
one of the General Staff, and asked the French peasant 
who the officer might be. "Why, that is Marshal Foch, 
who comes here every day to pray," said the peasant to 
the astonished American. General Foch, in his talks 
with God, received strength and wisdom in the great work 
he had to do. Just as the prayers of Washington helped 
save the cause of liberty in the American Revolution, so 



TALKING WITH GOD 117 

the prayers of Foch helped save the cause of liberty in 
the Great War. 

Oh, Lord, we thank Thee that we may talk with Thee 
often. May we not forget to talk with Thee every day, 
thanking Thee and asking Thy help in all things, for 
Jesus' sake. Amen. 



XVIII 

HOW TO CATCH FISH 

Text: "I Will Make You Fishers of Men." Mark I, 17. 
Illustrative Material: A Casting Rod, with a Line, Reel and 
Artificial Minnow. 

Do you boys and girls like to fish? I do, even more 
than I like any other sport. And do you like to catch 
them? I do too, although that isn't really necessary. 
Sometimes on my vacation I became so interested in fish- 
ing that I would forget to go in for my lunch until three 
or four o'clock, or for my dinner until almost dark. To 
catch three or four large mouth black bass, and once in a 
while a long slippery pike, and to have them baked for 
dinner, — my, I think that is about as much fun as most 
folks have in one day. 

To catch fish you of course have to go where they are, 
and you have to use the right kind of bait at each part 
of the season, for each kind of fish. The blue-gills and 
sunfish do not care the least for this Dowagiac game fish 
minnow, with which I have caught a number of bass. 
You have to have a line that is strong to hold the fish, 
and you have to be careful about bringing them up to the 
side of the boat and landing them. Fishing for big fish 
isn't easy, and you must be very patient, sometimes wait- 
ing nearly all morning for a bite or a strike. When you 
get a good one, it's worth it. 

As Jesus walked ^by the Sea of Galilee, He saw Peter 
with his brother Andrew mending their nets, for like so 

118 



HOW TO CATCH FISH 119 

many other people near that inland sea, they were fisher- 
men. Jesus did not say, "Come with me, I want you to 
preach the Gospel," but rather spoke to them in words 
they could best understand. He said, "Come with me, 
and I will make you fishers of men." Would they rather 
catch men than catch fish? Of course they would, and 
at once they left their nets and followed Him. 

Jesus calls each one of us to become fishers of men. 
He wants us along with our other work and play to catch 
folks for Him. Whom shall we fish for? Our friends, 
of course, first of all, for we would like to have them 
enjoy the same good things at church and at Junior 
Church that we enjoy. You can think now of several of 
your boy or girl friends, who would like to be here, if 
only you would invite them and tell them something about 
the Junior Church. Do your mother and father attend 
the church service? If not, you may catch them, too, for 
the Lord. 

How shall we catch them ? Let's think it over together. 
Everybody likes interesting and happy gatherings, and 
they like to meet nice folks. When you talk to your friend 
Harold or Jane or William or Mary don't say, "I want 
you to come to church and Sunday School next Sunday." 
Don't you think it would be much better to say something 
like this : "Harold, we have just the finest Junior Church 
you ever saw. We sing the happiest songs, and some- 
times get to sing in the Junior Choir. We have interesting 
talks by the man who preaches to us about "How a 
Shepherd Boy Became King," or "Keep to the Right," 
and we enjoy them ever so much. We have lots of fun 
too at the Junior Jollies or the Fun Days once a month. 
Our Sunday School Class is named the "Boosters" and 
since you are a good booster, I want you to be in it. Our 



120 THE JUNIOR CHURCH IN ACTION 

teacher tells us such interesting things about the great 
men of the Bible. I want you to come next Sunday as my 
special friend, and I'll come over to your house at ten- 
fifteen and we will go to Junior Church together." Of 
course your friend will be very much interested, and will 
be glad to come. You just try this this week, and see. 

Once you catch them for your Junior Church or Sun- 
day School, you must hold them, that is, as we say in 
fishing, you must land them. You must look after them 
for a while until they get into the habit of coming reg- 
ularly to church and Sunday School. It's easy, and does 
not take very much of your time. 

Next Sunday I want to see every boy and every girl 
bring some other boy or girl to Junior Church, — some one 
who has not attended before. Will you do it? Let me 
see the hands of those who are thinking of one friend 
whom they will invite this week, and if possible call for 
next Sunday morning. That's fine, for I know that you 
can all do it. That's real service for Christ and His 
Church, and He is glad when you become fishers of men, 
for Him. 

Dear Lord, make us fishers of men for Thee, in bring- 
ing our parents and friends to church and Sunday School 
to learn of Thee, for Jesus' sake. Amen.. 



XIX 

THE MESSAGE OF THE MAGNET 

Text: "And I, If I Be Lifted Up from the Earth, Will Draw 
All Men Unto Me." John XII, 32. 

Illustrative Material : A Magnet, Five Shingle Nails, Two Large 
Spikes, One Nail Covered with Tallow, a Rusty Nail, Several 
Matches and a Nail with a Cigarette Package Tied to it. 

When I was a bit younger than I am now, I often 
wondered what made tacks and nails stick to the magnet. 
I would rub it real hard to make sure that there was no 
glue or syrup on it. I know now, as many of you do, 
that the magnet can hold things because of a certain 
power of electricity inside it. For its size, it can lift quite 
a large load and hold it. 

While you use the magnet to play with, many of the 
great factories and steel world make it work. They 
have what they call an electric crane with a giant magnet 
attachment that will lift many hundred pounds. The man 
in the crane car lets the large magnet down until it 
touches the pile of iron he wishes to move. He then 
makes the magnet stronger by throwing a current of elec- 
tricity into it, and all of a sudden the steel or iron near 
the magnet jump at the magnet and are carried away to 
the place where they are to be made into automobiles 
or engines. When the spot is reached where they are 
needed, the engineer turns off the electricity and the whole 
load drops. 

For this magnet to work or to lift a load, there must 

121 



122 THE JUNIOR CHURCH IN ACTION 

be something in the nail or pin that responds to the 
magnetism. This match will of course not stick, because 
it is not made of iron, but the tacks and nails seem to 
enjoy hanging around the magnet. In the same way, God 
is the great magnet that is pulling us toward Him. He 
has made each of us in His Own image, that is, like Him, 
and if we have not changed ourselves, we feel the pull 
of God's love and Jesus' love on each one of us. All of 
us feel it strongly, and respond to Him as the iron does 
to the magnet. 

Sometimes men and women have been so wicked for 
so long that they can't hear God's voice, that they can't 
see God's works, that they can't understand the message 
of love that He sends to them. May we never be like that, 
for by coming to Junior Church and Sunday School we 
will keep our consciences pure and strong, that we may 
know that He watches over us always and helps us at 
all times. 

Do you notice that the magnet picks up the small nails 
and tacks much more easily than it does the big nails and 
the spikes? God's magnetism toward us works in just 
that way. He works on boys and girls ever so much more 
easily and often with better results than on very much 
older folks. I am sure that it is because the pure heart 
and life of a boy or girl answers God's pure and loving 
heart more quickly than does the life of some one who 
has been away from Him for years and years. 

Most folks become Christians before they are sixteen 
years of age. Jesus loved boys and girls because they 
were so much like His Heavenly Father, and because 
they were so willing to do as God wanted them to do. 
That's why our churches to-day are so much interested in 
the Sunday School and the Junior Church. There and in 



THE MESSAGE OF THE MAGNET 123 

the home are the usual places where boys and girls meet 
God. 

This nail is old and rusty, and this one is covered with 
tallow. Do you see how hard it is for the magnet to lift 
them? When men and women become surrounded with 
so many things like money and high offices and pleasures, 
they often are hard for God to reach with His love, unless 
they are using all those things for His work among folks. 
Or when even a small boy, which we will compare with 
this nail, has a cigarette package attached to him, it's 
awfully hard to reach him and hold him. When we cut 
the string that ties the bad habit to him, then it's easy 
to win him. 

As the magnet is pulling all the time, so God reaches 
out to folks every moment of the day. When He touches 
folks, as He has John Wesley or "Billy" Sunday or so 
many of His people here, they become forces to pull other 
folks to God, just as God has drawn them to Him. Do 
you see these four nails, which the magnet is holding, 
though only one of them is touching it? Just so long 
as we keep in touch with God, we can draw and hold 
others for Him. 

He wishes us to do that all through our lives by bring- 
ing our friends to Him in His church. How fine a thing 
it would be if on next Sunday each boy and each girl 
would bring at least one other boy or girl. Let's do it. 

Dear Lord, we thank Thee that Thou hast held us by 
Thy love in the way we should go. May we too draw 
others to Thee, for Jesus' sake. Amen. 



XX 

JUST MUD— AND A BULB 

Text: "Consider the Lilies." Matt. VI, 28. 
Illustrative Material: An Easter Lily and a Bulb. 

Some of the finest and best things in this world come 
from very small and modest beginnings. The soft carpet 
of grass on which we play or walk was once just a muddy 
plot of ground. But some tiny grass seed, which you 
could blow away with your breath, was sown there and 
grew into something that is both useful and beautiful. 
The spreading apple tree, from which we get such delicious 
apples, was once a very thin twig, which you could have 
broken with two fingers. Just so this Easter lily was 
once just an ugly brown bulb like the one I have in my 
hand. 

More than any other, the lily is the favorite flower of 
Christians at this time of the year. We love it because 
it is so pure and so beautiful and so fragrant. But we 
especially care for it because it reminds us of Jesus* 
glorious resurrection. It makes us glad to know that we 
have a Saviour, who died for us, but who is now living. 

How did the lily become so beautiful? It was not 
always so. You would never have guessed that so un- 
sightly a thing as this onion-shaped brown bulb could in 
a few short weeks have become one of the finest flowers 
of the earth. It is one of God's miracles that He performs 
every day. There are a few folks who find it hard to 

124 



JUST MUD— AND A BULB 125 

believe in miracles. I don't, because I see so many of 
them every day, — all about me. Just because God makes 
the sun rise each morning, and makes the grass and 
leaves come to life again each Spring, I can't see that 
these things are any the less wonderful, can you? 

So God touches this homely bulb with His sunshine, 
and sheds upon it His rain drops, and puts new life into it. 

Although completely smothered in the dirt it did as God 
planned it should do. How much more beautiful God 
made it than it could possibly have become by itself ! 
Don't you wish that all people were as sensible about let- 
ting God have His way with them as this bulb was? So 
many of them try to plan their own lives in their own 
way. Usually they make a mess of it. Sometimes they 
are rather successful, but their lives are not half so rich 
and happy and useful as if they had asked God what plan 
He had for their lives, and then had followed that plan. 
I guess they don't like to take advice from anyone, not 
even from Him who gave them life. Later they often 
wish they had. 

God could not have used this lily had it not trusted its 
life to Him. When it began to grow, first putting forth 
a few roots, then a green shoot, then two leaves, and last 
of all a bud that became this flower, it of course had no 
idea that sometime a very great honor would come to it. 
That it should be taken to the church altar on Easter 
Morning and have a place of honor among the flowers, 
and there remind folks of Jesus' life and death and resur- 
rection was beyond the hope of most flowers, if flowers 
could hope. That however was the good fortune of this 
lily. 

It added what little it had to the much that God had, 
and together they made one of the world's most beautiful 



126 THE JUNIOR CHURCH IN ACTION 

flowers. You and I haven't much to give to other folks ; 
very little money and perhaps not a great deal of talent 
or ability. L We may sometimes get discouraged and think 
that what we have is so little that nothing can be done 
with it. Alone we can do little with it, but with God's 
help we can do wonders. Do you remember the lad who 
helped Jesus feed the five thousand? Do you remember 
the little girl who told Naaman of the wonderful prophet, 
who could cure leprosy? Even the little that you have 
can be quite enough to do the work God has for you, if 
you add it to what He has. Give yourselves in service 
for others as the greatest gift you have. Give of your 
time to help others bear their heavy burdens. Give of 
your smiles to cheer the sad hearts of other folks. And 
like the lily God will bring you out into the large place 
of usefulness and happiness and beauty that He has for 
you. 

Dear Lord, we thank Thee that Thy Son, Jesus Christ, 
rose from the dead, and that He is now living. May we, 
like the lily, place ourselves in Thy hands and do Thy 
holy will, for Jesus' sake. Amen. 



THE END. 



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